Super Smash Duelists: Emissary of Subspace (Regular Version)
by The Creative Creator
Summary: Yugi and friends receive virtual gaming helmets made by both KaibaCorp and Industrial Illusions. These helmets transport their minds into the world of Super Smash Brothers Brawl. But, they soon learn that their real purpose were to stop an evil monster from escaping the game and entering the world so he can rule it. Can our heroes stop him? Contains mild violence.
1. Chapter 1

Super Smash Duelists: Emissary of Subspace

By: The Creative Creator

Disclaimer: I don't own Yu-Gi-Oh! or SSBB.

**Warning: If you had never played or watched SSBB on Classic Mode or Adventure Mode, DO NOT read this story, otherwise, this WILL contain spoilers.**

**AN: I wanted this to be my first story, but I decided to start off with a story on a popular, regular category, like Pokemon****. Please feel free to review, but no flames. This story takes place after the end of the original series. The information about the game's content is supported from research. Also, I'm using the characters' English names in this story. Enjoy! ;)**

Yugi had no idea where he is or how he got here. He's currently standing on a floating platform in the middle of darkness. The platform is blue and pinkish-purple in color. He looks around and sees nothing, just a world of darkness surrounding his position. He wears his usual clothing, leather pants, leather jacket, a pair of sneakers and a black shirt.

"W-what? Where am I?" he asks himself. Suddenly, he hears a deep, blood-curdling voice.

The voice only say four words, slowly, "Freeeee meeeee, orrrrrr eeeelse."

_Free me, or else? _Yugi thought.

"Freeeee meeeee, orrrrr eeeeelse," the voice repeated.

Yugi tries to find where the voice is coming from, "Where are you? Show yourself!" No response. The voice said nothing. Yugi is starting to get a little freaked out.

Suddenly, he heard something coming from behind him. He turns around and gasps as he sees a floating, light-blue man. "W-w-who are you?!" asked the frightened, spiky-haired boy.

The man brought out his right hand. A red blade forms in that hand. The man grips it by the handle. Yugi walks back a few steps, "What are you doing?!"

The man spoke louder than before, "Freeeee meeeee, orrrrr EEEEEELSE!"

During the last word, the demanding man strikes at Yugi with his blade extended out.

Yugi fell on his bottom, moving back faster, "NO! WAIT! PLEASE! NOOOOOOOOOOO...!"

Yugi woke up in his bed, the sun from his bedroom window shines upon his face. He wears his light-blue pajamas with gold stars scattered around.

He looks around the pentagonal room in fear. It hasn't really changed much during their last adventure. His desk by his bed is still located under the window mounted on the angled ceiling. A mirror is mounted on a wall by the other side of the bed. His light-blue wardrobe is still in front of the bed, by the bedroom door. He has a new shelf across from the bed, where he keeps his toys and cards in it, and it has a new TV on top.

Yugi pants heavily until he eventually calms down, "Oh thank goodness, it was just a dream, or a nightmare. _Wait a minute, that was the third time I had that nightmare. Why?_ Yugi thought.

The answer to that is yes. It wasn't the first time Yugi had that dream.

* * *

><p>Yugi walks out of his grandpa's game shop. The said old man is sweeping the floor inside the building. Yugi waves to his grandfather, "By Grandpa, I'm off to school!"<p>

Solomon waved back, "Have a good day, Yugi! Don't be late for dinner!" Yugi closes the door.

"I won't!"

"Hey, Yugi!" Yugi sees his good friend, Tea, running towards him. She wears her usual school uniform while Yugi wear his.

Yuhi greeted, "Morning, Tea! Ready to go?"

"Yeah, let's go!"

Yugi and Tea walks their way to school. They walk through Domino City, populated with many other people walking. The sounds of cars driving and honking and people chatting could always be heard throughout town.

Tea spoke up, "So, how things are going?"

"Oh, you know, the usual," he replies.

Tea keeps forgetting that he no longer wears his Millenium Puzzle. Her expression grew a bit sad. "Yeah, ever since the Pharaoh's spirit found peace over three months ago, it's been pretty."

Yugi's expression grew sad as well. He sighed while looking at the ground, "Yeah." The fact that Atem is gone isn't the only thing on Yugi's mind, and Yugi knows that. It was also that nightmare he keeps having.

After a minute of walking, the two made it to the school and entered.

* * *

><p>When Yugi and Tea walked into the classroom, they see Bakura and Duke Devlin watching Joey and Tristan playing Duel Monsters against each other. Bakura turns around, "Hey guys. Want to watch Joey and Tristan duel?"<p>

"Sure," said Tea. Yugi and Tea walked up. They see Joey and Tristan playing with their desks close, face-to-face with a dueling board lying on them. There is a piece of paper they use to keep up with their life point count. Right now, it's:

**Joey Wheeler/ 500 LP.**

**Tristan Taylor/ 1550 LP.**

Tea read the paper, "Wow, Joey! It looks like Tristan's been kicking your butt."

"Huh?" Joey looks up, "Oh, hey guys!" He looks back at Tristan, "Yeah, I'm falling behind, but something tells me that my next draw will change all that! **My move****!**" Joey picks up the top card from his deck of cards.

He excitedly yells, "Aw, yeah! Just what I needed!" The card he drew was a Polymerization Magic Card. He placed the card on a Magic & Trap Card Zone.

"I activate Polymerization! With this, I can fuse the monsters on my field!" The said monsters he has out is Flame Manipulator and Misaki, the Legendary Swordsman in Defence Mode.

"I fuse my two monsters to summon Flame Swordsman" Joey placed his monsters on the graveyard pile and grabbed a fusion monster from his Extra Deck and placed it on a Monster Zone.

"My swordsman will take down your guardian!"

Tristan has Obnoxious Celtic Guardian and a card face-down on his side of the field.

"Now, I attack!"

"Not so fast!" said Tristan. "You forgot my face-down card!"

He flips the card over, revealing to be the Magic Cylinder Trap Card. "Magic Cylinder negates you monster's attack, and then you lose life points equal to its Attack Points, so you lose 1700 life points. You lose!"

Joey was so stunned, he simply fell off his chair. His friends laughs at him, even Yugi, who cheered up a little.

"Thanks for letting me borrow your deck yesterday, Yugi," Tristan thanked as he gathers up all the cards and gives Yugi his deck back.

"Thanks, Tristan."

Out of nowhere, Joey pops out between Yugi and Tea, "Eh, doesn't matter, me and Tristan has a couple of things to really focus on. First off, Super Smash Brothers: Brawl is going to be released tonight."

"Super Smash Brothers: Brawl?" asked Yugi. "What's that?"

"WHAAAAT?!" the shocked boys yelled so loud, the entire floor could hear them.

"You never heard of it?!" Joey asked. "Super Smash Brothers: Brawl has been a huge, global excitement since Duel Monsters!"

Duke then starts to explain, "Super Smash Brothers: Brawl is a fighting video game for the Nintendo Wii. The fighters is and all-star cast of game characters from other popular games. Almost every game critic around the world gave it like a 10 out of 10 rating. "

"Oh, yeah. I did hear about that game," said Yugi.

"Yeah, so did I," added Tea.

"Yep, as soon as me and Tristan buy one of each, including some headsets so we can communicate, we're gonna go Wi-fi and have us a real duel!"

"Ok, and the other good news?"

"Huh? Oh yeah, of course. Serenity's coming to visit!"

"Really? How come?" Yugi asked.

"Well, our mom is going on this three-week business trip in California, and she can't let Serenity come with her. So she called and asked if Serenity could hang with me in my new crib and I said yeah."

"Wow, that's great!" Tea said happily. "When is she coming?"

"Tomorrow night," he answered.

"Yeah. And when she does, she can watch me take out her brother in SSBB tonight!" said Tristan.

Duke scoffs while flipping the bangs of his black hair, "The only thing she should be looking at is my game shop. I'll even show her my Dungeon Dice Monsters arena. You know, I still don't get why my game doesn't get-"

Tristan grabs Duke by his school shirt, "Hey, man, she's not interested in your lame substitute of Duel Monsters!"

"Get off me," Duke demanded.

"Come on, guys, don't start another fight," said Bakura.

"Besiiiiides." Joey puts the bickering duo in a headlock with each arm. "Serenity and I needed more family time, so I don't want any of you two to interrupt that. Are we clear?"

Both exclaims, "But-!"

Joey grips tighter. "ARE WE CLEAR?!"

Tristan and Duke sighs, "Yeah, we're clear."

"Good," Joey lets go. "So then, who wants to hear me and Tristan's version of the game's opera theme song? Anybody?"

"No, thank you "

"Not me."

"I'd rather play Duel Monsters."

"Sorry, guys."

"Hmph, haters," said Joey and Tristan.

"We don't hate, we appreciate," Yugi shrugged, not meaning to rhyme.

"Yeah, we just don't appreciate YOUR lame substitute for Super Smash Brothers' theme music," Duke laughs.

"Ok, that's it!" Tristan puts a headlock on Duke. Everyone's sweat drops anime-style while they laugh nervously.

**(How's that? Let me know in the reviews. Also, before you start wondering; yes, I edited this chapter to add a little more detail. See you guys next chapter!)**


	2. Chapter 2

Super Smash Duelists: Emissary of Subspace

By: The Creative Creator

Disclaimer: I'm not the owner of these two categories.

**AN:****This chapter has been edited.**** Please feel free to review, but no flames. **

It is now day two. Yugi and his grandpa are sitting in the table, eating breakfast.

As they were eating, Solomon notices his grandson's eyes. They have small, dark marks underneath them, not to mention that his eyelids are half-closed. "Hey, Yugi, are you alright?" asked his Grandfather.

Yugi didn't answer. He's just sitting there, quietly and slowly eating his food.

"**YUGI!**" The old man raised his voice, causing his grandson to snap out of drowsiness.

"Huh-wha?" Yugi stammered.

"I've asked if you're alright."

"Oh, nothing. Just kept having this crazy dream. It's been keeping me up every night."

Grandpa Moto thinks for a moment, "Is it about the Pharaoh? I know you miss him but..."

"It's not that, Grandpa. I had a nightmare, and I've kept having the same dream for four days now, but I don't wanna talk about it anymore."

"Why not? You can tell me about your nightmare. I'm your Grandpa."

"I know, Grandpa, I know." Yugi _did_ want to tell his grandpa, but he just couldn't. Not only it's hard, but it's also complicated to explain.

His Grandfather sighs in worry before looking at his brand new wristwatch Yugi got him for his birthday. "Er, Yugi, didn't you say that you have a test today?"

"Yeah, why?"

"Well, it's not that you're gonna be late. It's just that I saw the news this morning, and they say that the road you go through is closed because a semi truck fell through."

Yugi's fork that he was using made a clattering sound as he dropped it on his plate. His eyes became as big as fine china, "What?!"

"Oh, don't worry about the driver, he's perfectly fine."

"No! Not that! I have a test in 25 minutes! That road was the quickest way to school!" He gets off his chair and tries to rush to the living room, "I have to call Tea and-"

"Tea and your other friends are already at school and their parents are at work."

"What?! But the other roads would take at least 30 minutes!"

"Well, then I guess you better get going." He closes his eyes and crosses his arms, "Although, I really doubt that you could get to school on time through those roads, unless you can run really fast, like one of those characters in that new video game your friends keep talking about. What was his name again? Speedy the Porcupine?" He opens his eyes. Yugi had vanished, as if he was never there. He blinks in confusion, " Um, Yugi?"

* * *

><p>Yugi sprints through the streets of Domino City, causing smoky dust to appear. He sprints like he was running away from either the monster in his nightmares, or Rebecca trying to kiss him silly again. Due to his blue school uniform and his spiky hair, Yugi is running so fast, people have been mistaking him for a Sonic the Hedgehog, or Speedy the Porcupine, as his Grandpa thought he was called.<p>

Each women in dresses he passes, their dresses flew up , forcing the wearers to hold them down. When he ran past a magazine kiosk, almost all of the papers flew out instantly. Yugi has one more minute before the test. He finally made it to school grounds.

* * *

><p>"All right, class. Have everything off your desk except for a pen or pencil," the class teacher instructed. The class does what he says. except for Joey and Tristan, who looked like they've been up all night. "Your test will begin as soon as I pass them out."<p>

The teacher walks up to the door and closes it. But before walked away from it, he heard a loud thud. That sound startled the students.

The teacher opens the door to see Yugi Moto on the floor. The spiky-headed teen quickly picks himself up. "Sorry I'm late!"

"Mr. Moto, you're two minutes late to class. And you look a mess."

"I know, but you the road I walk through is closed and the other-"

"J-j-j-just sit down Mr. Moto, please."

Yugi lowers his head, "Yes, sir." He walks to his desk, which is located next to Tea's, and in front of Joey and Tristan's. As he sits down, Tea whispers to him.

"Hey, Yugi. Sorry I didn't get you earlier. I should've told you that there's a shortcut."

Yugi sighs while leaning on his desk, "It's alright, Tea."

The brunette then notices his exhausted complexion, "Wow, Yugi . You look about as tired as Joey and Tristan."

"How can you tell from them?"

Tea points at the mentioned boys from behind. The two boys are holding each other by each other's shoulder while sitting in their separate eyes as Yugi does. They chant the word "smash" over and over as if they've been hypnotized.

Tea laughs, "Looks like these two have been up all night playing that new game."

"Yeah, that's pretty funny," Yugi suddenly slams his face on his desk, falling asleep while snoring loudly.

"No sleeping in class, Mr. Moto," said the teacher.

Yugi snapped out his sleep, still very drowsy.

* * *

><p>After school, the gang went to eat at the burger joint where Tea used to work at. The restaurant still has its classic 1950s look. All the teenage waitresses in skirts delivers food to the customers while riding on roller skates professionally. They have a sign outside in the shape of glass filled with pink neon. Yugi, Tea, Joey, and Tristan are sitting in a table together, eating burgers, fries, soda, and milkshakes. Yugi sits next to Tea, in front of Joey, diagonal from Tristan, and by the window.<p>

Joey and Tristan are still tired from playing that game all night. Yugi is still tired from his nightmares about the butterfly man. Tea is worried about these three, especially Yugi.

Tristan starts to ask everyone, "Soooo, how did you guys do on the test today? I made a 'C minus'."

Joey answers, while lying his head on the table, "Eh not very good. I made a 'D'. "

"Well, I got an 'A' plus!" said Tea happily before facing Yugi. "What did you make, Yugi?"

The spiky-headed boy blushed when she asked him. His only response was a mumble.

"Huh?" asked the confused brown-haired girl.

"'f'..."

"Yuge, you mind speaking a little louder?" asked their blonde friend.

Yugi groans, "'F!'" He quickly covers his mouth with both his hands.

His friends winced in suprise, "Huh?!"

Yugi uncovers his mouth and groaned again, "An 'F', OK? I made an 'F' on the test."

"But, Yugi," Tristan speaking. "You always make a 'B' or an 'A' on all the tests."

"Yeah, what happened?" asked Joey. "Me and Tristan haven't studied much 'cause we were too excited about the game and my sister's visiting."

Yugi sighed, "Well, the truth is... I haven't studied at all."

"What? But why?" Asked Tea.

Yugi places his arms on the table and buries his face in them, "I don't wanna talk about it." His voice muffled.

"Aw, come on, Yugi," said Tristan. "You can tell us."

"No..."

"Come on, Yuge," begged Joey. "I'll give you five bucks."

"No."

"I'll let you borrow my Gearfried the Legend card."

"No."

"I'll let you date my sister."

"WHAT!?" Tea and Tristan yelled.

"I said 'no'."

Joey scoffs, "Fine!" After a moment, "I'll let you play Super Smash Bro-"

The irritated boy flips his head back up, "Alright, fine! Jeez!"

Tea looked even more worried, "Sheesh, Yugi. What's been bugging you? Is it about the Pharaoh?"

Yugi lowers his head, "No. It's just... See, I keep having this dream, or nightmare, and everyday, it's been keeping me up most of the night for four days."

"What kind of nightmare you've been havin'?" asked Tristan while he sips his milkshake.

"It's about this floating stage in the middle of darkness, and I'm always standing on it. There's also this floating, blue-colored man that comes up behind me."

* * *

><p>At nighttime, Yugi tells the rest of the story back at the game shop. Everyone is sitting in the living room. Yugi sits in the brown couch in front of the table. He sits between Tea and his grandpa. Joey and Tristan each sits on a separate ottoman between the sides of the table.<p>

"With a deep, bone-chilling voice, he says only these four words very slowly: 'Free me, or else'. Then, he eventually brings out a red blade and strikes at me. And finally, the next thing I know, I wake up in my bed, with my heart beating real fast. For four nights, I've been having that same dream ever since then. So that's why I'm so miserable right now."

After a moment of silence, his Grandpa and friends responds.

"Goodness," said his Grandpa. "It must've been horrible dreaming to that every night."

"Yeah, talk about repeating the same 'frightmare,'" said Joey, leaning on his lap.

"Looks like you should really take a vacation," suggested Tristan, crossing his arms.

"Are you gonna be Ok? You think you might have that dream again?" Tea asked twice while rubbing his shoulder.

Yugi shrugs his shoulder, "Eh, I think I'll be fine."

"Well, in that case," Tristan sat up. "I'm going back home to play some more Brawl."

"So am I!" Joey stands up. "Feel better, Yugi. Later!"

"Thanks, guys," Yugi thanked. By the way, Joey, how do you like your new house?"

The blond smiled and answered before he leaves, "Man, it was tight! You guys should come visit! I'll give you the address tomorrow. I already gave it to Serenity before she left." Joey winks while he gives his friends a thumbs up.

"We'd like that, Joey. Try not to stay up too late again, you guys!" Tea advised.

"We won't," said the boys as they march out with locked arms while humming the Super Smash Brother: Brawl theme song.

"Oh, for what it's like to be young again," Solomon fantasized.

Tea laughs before sitting up, "Well, I gotta go and do some homework. Try to sleep better, OK, Yugi?" She pats him on the head.

"OK, Tea," he nods.

"Good. Ciao!" The brunette wave goodbye before leaving the room.

Grandpa sits up, "Well, I think you better go to bed right now, Yugi. You look awfully exhausted."

Yugi smiles and agrees with a nod, "OK, Grandpa."

**(So, you think Yugi's week might get better? Find out on the next chapter. Please review! No flames, please! Later!)**


	3. Chapter 3

Super Smash Duelist: Emissary of Subspace

By: The Creative Creator

Disclaimer: You're kidding, right? I ain't no dang owner of Yu-Gi-Oh and SSBB!

"Ready to get owned again, Wheeler?" Tristan spoke from Joey's headset.

"Not as ready as I'm about to kick your butt into next month, cone-head," stated the confident blonde, sitting crisscrossed in his new, red bean bag in the middle of his new room while holding a white remote in his hands sideways like a game controller, which it is.

On the same night, Joey changed from his school uniform to regular, everyday clothing. He wears an orange T-shirt he won from the arcade with an image of the big, black spider on it. He also wears a pair of navy blue jean shorts, along with golden toe-tipped, black socks. **(AN: Those are the kind of socks I wear, BTW)**

After their last adventure with the Pharaoh, Joey moved into a new house in a decent neighborhood. His new room is a decent size: There's a large, open window next to a dresser with pictures of his friends on top on Joey's left.

On his right is a chair under a brown desk. Their is a new computer on the desk. Next to the desk is the door to his closet.

Behind him is the door next to his new bed. There is a lamp atop of a nightstand by his bed.

In front of Joey is a new TV on top of a black cabinet with a glass door. Inside the cabinet, a bunch of other video games can be seen through the glass. Beside the TV is a white, activated game console known as the Nintendo Wii.

Finally, between him is a stack of comic books and an open pizza box, almost empty, lying on the carpeted floor.

"Heh heh, I got you now, Tristan."

On the TV screen shows an elf-like man in a green tunic, wielding a sword in one hand, and a shield in the other. He is battling a Martial Artistic, gadget-using soldier wearing a silver camouflage suit in and out of a dark mansion.

Joey is playing as the elf man and Tristan is the soldier. They are both fighting each other in separate homes through Wi-fi connections.

_**The main game mechanic is to simply knock your opponent(s) and send them off the screen in order to win.**_

On the below side of the screen are percentages with the characters' faces, symbols, and names on them, Link and Snake. A player's percentage gets raised whenever his or her character gets hit. The higher the percentage gets, the more chance for the character to lose.

Tristan speaks through Joey's headset, **"Get ready, Wheeler. 'Cause Solid Snake is gonna take out fairy boy with a few hits!"**

"Yeah? We'll see about that!" Joey grins.

On the roof of the mansion, Link the elf warrior attempts to slash Snake the soldier with his sword. The soldier jumps in the air to dodge the attack. While in the air, the Snake delivers a kick to the swordsman's face, making him fly backwards and landed on his back.

Joey's grin deflated, "What?! Alright, you asked for it!"

Joey makes his swordsman get up. When the man in green did, Joey noticed a wooden, baseball bat spawning in front of him.

When the blonde boy grins as he presses a button to grab the bat, he makes his character come closer to Tristan's with it. He laughs deviously, "Hey, Tristan, got somethin' for ya."

"**Aw, hey, man!"** Tristan starts yelling in a panic, **"That bat's instant kill if you hit me with that with force!"**

"Thaaaaaat's riiiiight."

Snake was about to run away, but when the sound of gasping audience was heard out of nowhere, a floating ball appeared above Tristan's character. The orb glows with several colors.

Joey let out a scream, "It's the Smash Ball!"

The Smash Ball is a glowing orb that floats in the air randomly. Whoever breaks the ball first will be able to unleash their ultimate power, known as their Final Smash.

"It's mine!" Joey and Tristan's warriors jumps up to get it. Joey tries to throw his bat at it to break it a little. But, instead of the ball, the bat aimed at Tristan's soldier. His soldier grabbed the wooden bat just in time. "Hey! That's mine!"

**"Not anymore,"** corrected Tristan.

The blonde becomes enraged, "Oh, why you little-"

Joey's jaw dropped when he heard a shattering sound in the television screen. It seemed that Tristan's soldier had used the bat he stole to break the Smash Ball. When he did, the effects made the mansion darker than it already is.

Rainbow-colored aura glows around Snake's body. His eyes glows a bright, golden yellow.

**"Heh heh heh, here I come, Wheeler!"**

"TRISTAN! YOU WOULDN'T DA-"

"It's show time. **GRENADE LAUNCHER****,**" called the soldier before jumping up in the sky, disappearing from sight.

Then, the sound of a helicopter is heard from up above. Next, a rope ladder dropped down, close to the TV screen. Tristan's soldier is hanging on to it with his left hand, while holding a grenade launcher in his left hand.

Tristan yells through Joey's headset again,** "Alright, Joey."** He speaks with a Latin accent, **"Say hello to my little friend!"**

The soldier aims his launcher at Link and fires grenades at him. Joey managed to dodge every explosive. After six rounds, the soldier reloaded and continued with his firing.

A grenade managed to hit Joey's Link. His percentage has gotten so high. A second grenade hits him. His damage percentage is 232.

The blonde frantically exclaims. "Oh, no!"

Snake launches one more grenade. This one blew Link up sky-high.

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"

Joey's avatar blasted off into the sky and then immediately starts falling in the background. As he then disappeared into a twinkling star, the word "game" in all caps appeared on the screen.

Next, a scene showed up in the TV, announcing Snake Number 1 and Link Number 2.

**"Aw, yeah! Tristan Taylor: Numbuh 1!"** Tristan gloated.

Joey quickly sat up and angrily throws both his headset and his Wii remote into the floor, "DANG IT!"

Tristan's voice could still be heard from the blonde's headset, **"Sheesh, Joe, chill! It's just a game. It's not that you stink."**

Joey cools down a little and sighed, "Eh, I guess you're right, Tristan. We really shouldn't let this game-"

**"Nah, just kidding!"**

"Huh?"

**"You stink at this game, dude. No wonder you're always 'Number 2'."**

"What?!" Joey's blood rises from his toe to his head, turning his skin light-red. He then brought out his hand and clenches it into a fist, "Tristan, so help me, I oughta-" **(Ding-Dong!)**

Joey gets interrupted when he heard the doorbell ringing.

**"Hey, is that your sister** **at the door? Can I talk to her?"**

Joey picks up his headset, "Not in your life." He pressed a button on the headset and shuts it off.

Joey then turns around and walked over to his door before he walks out. The outer side of his bedroom door has a door-size poster of him with the text that says "**The Lair of Joey Wheeler: Prince of Games! Nevva forget it!**" taped to it. He chuckles to himself to the sight of his poster.

The doorbell continued to ring. "Coming!" Joey walks through a small hallway connected to his room. His door is on the end wall. The door to the bathroom is on the right side of the hall, and the door to an empty room is on the same one. A flight of stairs is connected to the other end of the hallway to the left.

He walks down the stairs, which led into the living room. The room is a bit big. It has furniture that are more homey than fancy, simply just average couches, chairs, a coffee table, and a big TV.

Joey turns to the front door, which is located behind the stairs. When he walks up to the door, he opened it.

When he opens, he sees a person holding a large teddy bear. With jolly, manly voice, the person says, "Hello. Could you tell me where a handsome, blonde, expert duelist lives? His name is Joey Wheeler and his best friend in Yugi Moto!"

Joey grins, places his hand to his chin to do a handsome pose, and answered, "Weeeeeell, maybe if your holder would move you out of her sight, then I bet she would know where her awesome big bro lives."

The person holding the stuffed bear giggled with a young, feminine voice before moving it out of sight to reveal to be Serenity Wheeler, Joey's baby sister. "Hi, brother," she greeted happily and loudly.

Serenity's appearance could be easily seen due to the porch light hanging up on top of the door. The girl wears a black shirt with a unicorn image on it. Her red hair is in a ponytail. She also wears light-blue jeans, two pink bracelets on her right wrist, yellow sandals, and a blue pearl necklace.

Within seconds, the two happy siblings engaged in a bear hug. "It's really great to see you again, sis!"

They let go after a good ten seconds. Joey asks, "So, how things been goin', Serenity?"

"Great," she answered cheerfully. "Mom's been doing well at her job, and I've made many friends at my new school! How about you?"

"Same here! Ya wanna check out my new house?"

"Yeah! Could you help me with my suitcases first, though?"

Joey failed to notice that between his sister are two girly designed suitcases standing on the porch the first time. "Oh, right! Sure, sis!" Each lifted one suitcase and carried them into the house.

After ten minutes of touring through the house, the Wheelers finally made their last stop to Joey's new bedroom. Serenity loves the poster on the door. When the siblings entered the room Joey's sister was amazed at first sight, "Wow, this is the coolest bedroom I've ever seen."

"Well, I don't mean to brag, but-"

"Hey, were you playing Super Smash Bros. Brawl?" Serenity points at the TV with the scores showing on the screen.

"Uuuuuuhhhhh, yeah, I was."

Serenity laughs joyfully as she dashes across the room and jumps on the bean bag. "I've kept asking Mom for allowance so I can get this game!"

Joey gives his sister a light smile.

She turns to face him, "Hey, how were you able to pay for all of this anyway?"

"Oh, yeah. I sold most of my older stuff on the internet. I also work as an expert chef at this really fancy new restaurant downtown. They pay me almost $3,000 a month. Today's my night off."

"Wow," said the amazed red-head. "So anyway, can I play?"

"Sure, Serenity. We can play together. I brought an extra Wii remote. But let me logout of the Wi-fi, first."

Joey walks over to his remote. He then uses it to go back to the main menu, not really caring if Tristan's wondering if he's coming back to play with him.

* * *

><p>The Wheelers played SSBB for almost half an hour. Joey had out his wheeled desk chair while Serenity remained on the bean bag. The red-haired girl ate the remaining pizza Joey didn't eat, even though their kinda cooled. After another few minutes, they decided to call it a day and turned the Wii off.<p>

Joey stares at his sister while thinking, _Man, we've just met again and already we're havin' a blast! And just how I wanted, too, havin' fun together as siblings in private. It's been a while since I've seen her so happy. This is just like the time when we were little, playing at the beach 'til sunset together with nobody to bother us. Though, our childhood was pretty rough, with our parents' divorce, forcing us to separate. And even though Battle City was really crazy too, we still had a pretty great time together, along with our friends... and Kaiba._

"Hey, Joey," Serenity looks at his blonde, older brother. "Where do I sleep?"

Joey snaps out of thought, "Oh! Uh, when you leave this room, your room is through the second door to your right. I got an inflatable mattress in the garage."

Serenity nods, "Okay, Joey. I left my luggage in the living room. I'll bring those to the room while you get the bed."

"Alright, Serenity. C'mon." Joey sat up from his chair before helping her sister off the bean bag. They then hold hands before walking out of the room together.

* * *

><p>During midnight at the game shop, Yugi is finally sleeping peacefully in his room upstairs in his bed, until...<p>

"Freeeeeeeee meeeeeeeee, oooooooorrrrrrr eeeeeeeeelse..."

"Aah!" Yugi snapped out of his sleep and instantly sat up, breathing very hard. He held his chest as his heart started pounding real fast. After a minute, it calmed down, making Yugi calm down. "Man, what do I gotta do to stop having this dream?"

As soon as he sat up from his bed, his Grandpa entered the room in his polka-dotted pajamas and turned on the lights. "Yugi," he said. "Are you having that dream again?"

The spiky-headed boy stood up out of his bed, "Yeah, Grandpa." He turns to face his grandfather. "I don't know how it could get any worse."

The old man sweat-drops, "Um, I think it'd be best not to jinx yourself." He points at Yugi's lower body half. Yugi looked down and blushed deeply when he discovers a big, wet spot on the top of his pajama pants. "OH, MAN!" He quickly covers himself with his hands embarrassingly. He got on his knees and thought, _Great! If this keeps up, I'm gonna have to wear diapers for the rest of my High School years!"_

**(Poor Yugi. Please review! Later!)**


	4. Chapter 4

On a Friday, it's been a week since Yugi failed the test. His teacher allowed him to retake it and he passed, not missing any question. After school, Yugi's friends took him to the arcade to celebrate.

In the arcade, kids play games like there's no tomorrow. Some of the guys are using the crank machines to win a prize for a lucky girl. The place is filled with the sounds of laughter, chatting, and loud music.

The large dancing game at the end of the large room seems to be attracting a huge crowd, that reason is because the two dancers currently playing on the stage is none other than Yugi and Tea.

Yugi and Tea faces each other in the dance-off machine, the same one where Tea wiped the dance floor with Johnny Steps. The screen shows kaleidoscopic, rainbow neon, followed by raining arrows to tell them wear to step with flashing words. The stereos around and under the screen plays loud, booming, techno beats. Yugi's eyes is no longer exhausted-looking. No more dark marks or bags under his eyes.

On the dance floor, Yugi seems to be beating the female champion by a few points. Joey, Tristan, Duke, and Bakura watch from behind in amazement, along with a huge crowd behind them.** "GET YOUR GROOVE ON!"** Said the announcer on the screen. **"WORK IT, NOW!"**

"Man, the Queen of Dancing losing to the King of Games," said a voice in the crowd.

Another voice said, "I know, right? Is there anything Yugi can't do?"

The loud techno-pop music spreads the entire arcade. Tea's score managed to keep up with Yugi's.

"If you like that, then you're gonna love this!" The short, spiky-haired teen drops onto his foot panels and performs a wicked floor dance.

"WOAH!" The boys and the crowd exclaimed in surprise.

"Since when can Yugi do that ?" Duke asked surprisingly.

"Oh yeah? Two can play at that game," Tea declared before dropping onto her panels and doing the same thing. The crowd exclaims in excitement. The two dancers stood back up. They step on the panels much faster than before.

Yugi never felt so alive in months. Tea feels the same way right now. She felt like she's dancing on a show stage, performing in front of amazed fans in a huge theater, with stars floating around him.

After fifteen more seconds, the match ended. The announcer voice called out the results, **"IT'S A TIE!" **Though, they were surprised, the boys and the crowd gave a round of applause. Yugi and Tea were out of breath. They then looked at each other gave each a high-five. Tea is just happy that Yugi is feeling much better.

* * *

><p>A few hours later, the gang went outside to call it a day. The sky is turning orange because it's sunset now. They walk down the street on an empty sidewalk. The sounds of cars driving and honking were heard throughout the streets.<p>

Yugi is walking beside Tea. He looks up at her and spoke. "Hey, uh, sorry for almost stealing your championship title, Tea," Yugi apologizes.

The brunette looks down at him and smiles, "No biggie, Yugi. I'm just glad that you're feeling much better now."

Yugi smiles back and nods, "Thanks Tea."

Before they leave the area, Serenity found them and ran up from their left. "Hey, you guys!" When the gang saw her, Tristan and Duke suddenly have hearts for eyes.

The red-haired girl has her hair down like usual. She wears two hair clips on it: one with a strawberry on it and the other with a pink heart. She also wears a red shirt, a beige skirt, and some flip-flop sandals without socks.

She greets her friends as she caught up with them, "Joey! Yugi!"

Joey greets back, "Hey, sis!"

Tea also greeted, "Serenity! It's so good to see you again! How you been?"

"I'm doing great, Tea. Joey showed me his **AWESOME**, new house. How you guys been doing?"

"Nothing much different," Yugi replied. "Same old, same old."

Serenity giggles at Yugi's comment. She then takes a look at Bakura. She asks him, "Hey, didn't I see you before?"

The white-haired teen blinked and pointed his finger towards himself, "Who? Me?"

A memory popped into backed into her head. She gasps, "Hey, now I remember you! You're the poor guy who got injured during the Battle City finals!"

"Huh?" A memory pops into his head, "Oh, right! The Spirit of the Millenium Ring took control of my body and dueled against Yugi."

An imaginary question mark appeared on top of Serenity's red-head, "Um, what?"

Duke surprisingly pops out beside Serenity, startling her. "Hey, Serenity. Why don't we check out your brother's 'awesome', new house of his, together?" The black-haired teen wraps an arm around her shoulder.

"Oh. Well, uh..." Before the redhead could respond, Tristan popped out, dividing Duke and Serenity.

Tristan faces Duke,"Hey, you! It's impolite to be wrapping your greasy arms around a lady like that without permission!"

Tea drags Serenity away. Duke pretends to toughen up, "Oh yeah?! Well, at least _I_ don't lie to her about you teaching Joey how to play Duel Monsters like she's a-"

**"I TOLD YOU CLOWNS NOT TO BOTHA' MY SISTAH, YA PINHEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAADS!" **Joey popped out behind the two. His head swelled cartoon-style and his big mouth was so loud. The yelling was so loud, the sound when through their eardrums and into their brains. Their brains' malfunctions caused them to become completely immobilized.

Joey returns back to normal and realized what happened. "Um, oops?"

The others laugh nervously as sweat drops on their heads anime-style.

"Hey!"

The gang turns around to see the familiar child running towards them. He has large, bushy, black hair and slightly tanned skin. He wears a yellow vest, a stripped shirt over it, blue jeans, silver and yellow sneakers, and a pendant in the form of a Duel Monsters card. He drags a silver wagon full of boxes with him.

Yugi said, "Hey! It's Mokuba!"

Mokuba stops in front of the gang and Serenity says, "Hi Mokuba!"

"Hey, Serenity! Good to see you guys again." Mokuba's smile dropped down as he notices Tristan and Duke as stiff as statues while doing a goofy, startled pose, with Joey standing behind them. The confused Kaiba kid points to them, "Uh, why are those two..?"

"Ehh, don't worry about them," Joey interrupts as he squeeze through the "statues" and walks over.

"So," the blonde started to ask. "What are you and your brother up to this time?"

Mokuba smiles again, "There's some good news for I like to bring out. You heard of the new game: Super Smash Brother Brawl?"

Everyone but Tristan and Duke answered with a "yes".

"Well," Mokuba drags his silver wagon over to the front. The gang awed at the shiny boxes. The boxes each have on a picture of a machine-like helmet.

The bushy-haired boy picks one of them up to show it to the gang, "Industrial Illusions and KaibaCorp invented these cool, new game helmets."

Yugi asks, "Wait, you mean that Pegasus and your brother are actually working together?"

Joey also asks, "Yeah, don't they hate each other?"

"Well, yeah, but that's not the point. These supercool, virtual, game helmets sends your mind into the world of Super Smash Brothers Brawl. It has all the data that any copy could possess. Just find a safe place to lay your body on and wear them. The instruction manuals will help you. So whatcha guys think?"

The gang briefly exchange looks in concern.

"Um, I don't know," said Bakura.

Joey responds while crossing his arms, "Eh, I don't buy it. I don't trust either of those two. Heck, they barely trust _each other_."

Mokuba groans, "Look, they really need more people to test these out other then themselves and me, and they trust everyone we know only, including the seven of you guys, to help out. So can you guys just test these out before we decide to make a worldwide amount? They're even free of charge. Please?"

Yugi, Tea, Joey, Serenity, and Bakura look at each other for a brief moment. Yugi smiles spoke up first, "Sure, why not?"

"I guess it wouldn't hurt to have a little fun," said Tea.

"Sure, I'll take one," replied Bakura.

Serenity answers cheerfully, "Sure! I always wanted to play that game! Can we, Joey?" She looks up to her brother.

Joey sighed, "Fine, I guess. But only because my sister wanted to play badly. I still don't trust that Kaiba **OR** Pegasus."

"Great," Mokuba gladly smiles. "I only brought four helmets with me for now. I'll ask Seto to deliver more to the rest of you. For now, please take a game helmet, everyone!"

Mokuba gives Yugi the helmet he was holding. Then, Tea and Bakura grabbed one of each.

Joey picks up the last box, "We can share this one when we get back, Serenity."

"Great," the red-head replied. "But, uh, don't you have to go to work tonight?"

"Huh," the blonde answered as he takes a glance at his wristwatch, and yelled, "Oh no! It's 5:50, and I have to be there by 6:00! Serenity, the key's under the doormat when you get home, got it?"

Serenity nods.

"Good. I'll see you guys later!" The blonde gives his red-haired sister the helmet before dashing off to downtown.

Serenity calls out for him, "Good luck, Big Brother!"

Tea places a hand on her hip, "That Joey always gets his way, does he?"

Just then, Tristan and Duke snapped out of immobilization and regained mobilization. They both fell down on their faces on the hard concrete.

The gang turned around. Tristan lifts his face up, groaning, "What did we miss?"

The others start laughing at their sillyness.

"What's so funny?"

* * *

><p><strong>(Please Review!) I might edit this later.<strong>


	5. Chapter 5

On a starry night, in Joey's new residence, Joey enters at his bedroom door. He wears an all-white chef uniform and a matching french cooking hat on his head. His eyes drooped with exhaustion and his sore arms felt like noodles, like the noodles he's been cutting up all night, along with many other meals.

"Big Brother?" said Serenity. The red-haired girl was in the middle of the bright room sitting on the bean bag on her stomach reading a manga comic book, with some other comics scattered by the bean bag. Her long hair blows backwards from the open window she faces towards to keep cool. She looks up at her brother standing at the door and asks, "Are you all right? How was work?"

Her blonde, older brother only groaned in response and plops on his front, on his nearby bed, still groaning.

"Joey?" Serenity buts her book down, gets up, and walks to her brother. She kneels down and gently rubs Joey's back. Her smooth rubbing soothes the poor blonde's exhaustion and stopped him from groaning. It felt like an angelic masseuse from Heaven giving him the rub of his life.

Joey lifts up his face. He smiles as he looks up at his precious sister, into her kind, brown eyes. "Thanks, Sis. I really needed that," he said.

Serenity smiles back, "Has your job always made you this tired?" She stops rubbing as her brother sits up on his bed.

He takes off his hat and sets it on the nightstand, "Not all da' time, Sis. We just had too many customers tonight. That's all."

"That must have been a total pain."

"Nah! It was nuthin'," he shrugged. "So anyways, have you tried out one of those fancy schmancy helmets Mokuba gave us?"

"Not yet. I wanted to wait until you get home, but I didn't think you'd be here _this_ late."

The blonde has a confused look on his face, "Huh?" but he eventually gets what she means. "Oh, yeah. I don't get back home 'til 11:00. Guess I forgot to tell ya dat." He laughs while rubbing the back of his head.

Serenity closes her eyes as she briefly giggles, "That's okay, Joey." She then opens them back up.

Joey then yawns deeply while stretching out his arms, "Well anyway, I think we should both hit the-" The blonde teen gets interrupted when he felt a vibration in his apron pocket. "Oh, wait a minute." When he reaches out his pocket, he brought out his cellphone.

He answers the phone. "Yo... Hey, Tristan... Lemme guess: you figured I was home; so you could talk to Sere- Oh, you're not?"

Serenity's brown eyes blinks in confusion.

"You said you tried out the helmets? How was it?" Joey's suddenly widen, "What?! No way! Are you for real?"

Serenity asks, "What? What is it?"

The blonde grew too excited to answer his sister, "No way. I gotta try mine. You're about to use yours again? Sweet. I'll try mine on. Just give me a few minutes. See ya!"

He pressed the End Call button. "Hee, hee, hee, hee, hee," he chortled.

"What is going on, Joey?"

Joey stops chuckling and responds excitedly while talking really fast, "Okay, so Tristan called and told me that the helmets connects your mind into the game's software wirelessly, well already know that. But anyway, then when your mind enters it, you get to pick what character you wanna be, and when you do, you literally become that character, or at least dress up as that character. And then..."

Not able to keep up, Serenity's eyes repeatedly rolls around in confusion while her brother's still running his mouth. She shakes her head and interrupts by grabbing his shoulders, "Joey, slow down! Just get to the point."

He talks a little slower, "The helmets sends your mind into the new game in the internet via Wi-fi. When it does, you can choose a character, and then you'll dress as that character and fight like that character."

Serenity gasped, "Oh, wow! That sounds so cool!"

"Yep. And now the first thing I'm gonna do is try out that helmet!"

"What? But wait, I thought you said you're tired from work. And didn't the others say that you and Tristan had trouble sleeping just from playing the game last week? Why would you-"

"Hold 'dat thought, Sis," Joey blocks her lips with his finger, "I gotta meet Tristan at the game world. Where'd you put the helmet?" He unblocks her lips.

"Uh, it's over there," she points to the silver box sitting by the TV.

"Great! Thanks!" The older teen rushes to the box.

"But, Joey-"

"Serenity," he faces her after lifting up the box, "Don't worry about me. I'll be fine. And besides, it's the weekend, isn't it?"

"Well, yeah. But-"

"Can't talk now! I gotta fix this baby up! And, uh, I'm gonna need some alone time."

Before she could say anything else, Serenity finds herself pushed out of the room by her brother and ends up in the hallway.

"Goodnight!" he said with a wave and a weird smile on his face before slamming the door shut.

The redhead turns to face the door with the poster mounted on it and yells out, "Hey, wait! Could I at least have my comic books back?"

The door opens and a stack of her manga books were thrown into her arms.

"Ya' welcome," said the blonde teen before slamming the door shut again.

Serenity blinks a few times and then sighed disappointedly. As much as she loves her brother, she still fails to see how they're related. But she started to smile as she knows her brother is happy after having a rough day at work.

* * *

><p><strong>(Sorry for the short chapter. I know this wasn't worth the long wait. Please review for more support.)<strong>


	6. Chapter 6

**(AN: In this chapter, a scene in complete italics represents a flashback. This is definitely the longest chapter I've ever written, period. Enjoy!)**

Another shiny day at the game shop. The rays from the sunlight started to beam through Yugi's angled bedroom window. The area starts to glow with all of the sun's brightness.

Yugi is in his bed again, having a good sleep. His eyelids start to flutter and opened slowly as he makes a soft, moaning sound. His droopy eyes scan around the pentagonal room, realizing he's back to reality. He sits up, rubbing his eyes with his right palm.

Yugi then looks around the room, still alone. After a few minutes, he stretches his arms wide and yawned.

He smiles, "Another goodnight's sleep for me."

With eyes wide open, he hops off his bed and walked over to his mirror. He wants to make sure that his eyes aren't baggy or dark. As he faces the mirror, nothing under his eyes.

He feels very happy. He stopped having that terrible dream about that evil, winged man. He hasn't been having it for a week.

As he lines the under part of his left eye with his finger, Yugi spots an object shining from the sun, a snapshot picture taped on the top-left corner of the mirror. He detaches it from the glass and took a closer look.

The snapshot is a picture of Yami and friends having a picnic. Yugi smiles at this image. They all looked so happy together.

Yugi felt happy with this picture, but has a touch of sadness in his heart. He really misses Yami. He was like a brother to him, aside from the similar features. Just looking at him only made him miss him even more.

**(Warning: To avoid spoilers, please do not read this flashback if you have not seen the anime's last episode, and scroll down to the next set of bold parentheses to read the present time again.)**

Yugi's smile slowly morphs into a frown. He still remembers the last time they've seen each other. When they found out the Pharoah's real name, Atem, they arrived in his tomb in Egypt. As soon as they gathered all seven millenium items, Yugi and Atem separated into two. In order to decide whether Atem returns to rest or not, he and Yugi had an epic duel. Since Yugi won that duel, Atem is finally sent to peace. Yugi could still remember the last time he and anyone seen Atem, the day they said their final goodbyes.

* * *

><p><em>In the Pharoah's tomb, Atem stands in front of the shining gateway to his true home, with his face facing the stone floor, and eyes closed. The teary-eyed Yugi stood on the same layer as he. Tea, Joey, and Tristan stood close to Yugi as everyone else, Solomon, Bakura, Duke, Seto, Mokuba, Marik, Odion, and Ishizu, stood far behind, having their bodies illuminated by the light and preparing to watch Atem disappear into the shining, bright light.<em>

_Joey, Tea, and Tristan also had some tears forming in their eyes. They have all been through so much together since they lives changed ever since they met the Pharoah. Seeing the Pharoah leave was too hard for them._

_They didn't want Yami to leave, especially Yugi. Yami didn't really want to, either, but it was for the best. His people needed a wise ruler._

_Joey and Tristan wiped the tears off their faces, but Tea still has tears falling down her own face. _

_[Goodbye, Atem... and good luck], thought Tea as she places a hand over her heart._

_Before Atem begins to walk into the light, Joey decided to make his final farewells. With tears still bubbling in his eyes, the blonde teen raises his right fist, with a proud smile in his face. "Hey! Pharaoh! I hate to break the terrible news to 'ya, but you're not goin' anywhere..."_

_Atem gasps as he lifted his head up and shot his eyes open in response of surprise._

_Joey continued, "... 'cause everything you've given us stays right here, in our hearts!" _

_With a smile of his own, Atem turns his head to the others and nodded, "Right!"_

_"Like we always say: 'it's your move!'" said Yugi with a proud attitude of his own._

_Atem faces back_ to_ the light. He extends his right arm and gave everybody a thumbs up before walking into the light._

_With their tears sparkling from the light, Yugi, Tea, Joey, and Tristan stood tall and proud as everyone watches from behind._

_When Atem is about to enter, his leather clothing morphs into his royal purple cape. As the cape blows upward, he reveals to be wearing his traditional, Egyptian pharaoh attire._

_His loyal servants appears in front of him, waiting to reunite with their young king at long last. As Atem finally disappears into the light, the doors that opened the passageway begins to close slowly._

_Tea tries to run after the pharaoh, but Joey stops her by grabbing her shoulder. The door finally closes, revealing the Eye of Anubis on it,causing the room to go dark, never to be opened again._

_"He's gone," said Tea as she whimper in sorrow._

_"Well, Pharaoh, goodbye..." said Yugi as tears falls down his face again. Everybody stood inside the tomb. Everything was in complete silence._

* * *

><p><strong>(This flashback scene is over. Now back to the present.)<strong>

* * *

><p>Yugi stands in front of the mirror with the snapshot still in his fingertips. His eyes begin to produce tears. He missed Yami so much. His life was so tough before he solved the Millenium Puzzle and freed Yami's spirit. He was a very close friend.<p>

While Yugi wipes the tears off with one of his pajama sleeves, a he heard his telephone ringing. He turns to the phone, it is located at the far desk from his bed. He sticks the picture back on the mirror and walks towards the phone. He picks up the phone, pressed the green button, and answered, "Hello?"

Yugi hears Tea's voice from the phone, "Hey, Yugi? It's me, Tea."

"Oh, hey, Tea. What's up?"

"Well, it's Saturday, and I don't have any plans, and I'm pretty sure you don't, either. Soooo, you wanna hang out? Just you and me?"

Yugi blushes and hesitated, "Uh, sure. How about I meet you at the front of that new mall, at 12:00 PM?"

"Sounds awesome! I'll be there. Later, Yugi!"

"See you soon, Tea!" Yugi hears Tea hanging up the phone as he does the same. Yugi smiles and his blushing fades away when he seems to cheer up as he's about to hang out with one of his best friends.

_Maybe hanging out with Tea will take my mind off the Pharaoh,_ he thought. _Or at least I hope so._

* * *

><p>Yugi arrives at the front of the new mall he mentioned. He wears his usual leather pants and jacket, with his black undershirt and matching shoes.<p>

The spiky-haired teen is surrounded by a small sea of people walking in or out of the tall building. He stood there alone and looks up at the building. It's cylindrical, it's about five floors tall, and the wall is made of shiny glass that anyone can see through. The sun gives the glass a bright, glistening shine, making the mall beautiful and easy to spot from far distances.

Yugi heard that this mall made its grand opening about a month ago. He also heard that it has been nominated "Best Mall In Domino City". He's very much surprised that neither Kaiba or Pegasus built this mall.

Yugi looks around to see if Tea's around yet. There is no sign of her yet. He lifts his wrist up and took a good look at his wristwatch, it indicates that it is noon. Yugi frowned and thought, _Hmm, Tea should be here about now. _

As he hears nothing but indistinct voices from the people around him, Yugi suddenly hears a faint voice yelling his name. He takes his eyes off his watch and looks around, seeing only people passing by. The voice has gotten closer and louder. After a few more seconds, he looks from behind and saw Tea running towards him.

The brunette wears a green tanktop with blue skinny jeans and caramel-brown boots. She has a long-strap purse around her left shoulder that matches the color of her boots. She also has five differently colored bracelets around her right wrist, which she is using to wave to Yugi.

Yugi turned to face her, smiled, and waved back, "Hey, Tea!"

When the two teens meet, there is no more crowd around, gor now. Yugi and Tea looks up at the new mall. They can see the big sign on top of the entrance that says "Welcome to Domino Heights".

"So this place is called Domino Heights, huh?" asked Tea with her right hand on her hip.

"Yep," Yugi said, "it was nominated the best mall in the city."

"Cool. Why don't we go in?" Tea looks down at Yugi.

Yugi looked up at her and nodded, "Yeah!"

* * *

><p>As the two teenagers stood in the middle of the bottom floor, they look around the exterior of the mall. There are fountains and palm trees everywhere on the main floor. Yugi sees two glass elevators on the opposite sides of the building. Tea can see the higher floors connected to the elevators. They can also see a large on the ceiling. The sun beams through the glass building and makes everywhere bright enough, making the use of artificial lighting unnecessary during daytime.<p>

Yugi and Tea both looked around in amazement. "Wow! This place looks amazing!" Tea exclaimed.

"Yeah! Not only this mall looks good, but thanks to the glass walls letting the sun's light into the inside, we could also save a lot of energy," Yugi informed.

"Yeah! And I heard that the walls and windows here are all made of special glass that prevents them from causing a greenhouse effect and prevents the place from being too bright! I just love it when we have a place that's both fun and helps the environment."

They could smell the food from the food courts and the popcorn from the theater sections on the same floor. And they could also see chandeliers hanging off the ceilings under each floor.

Tea looks down at her short friend, "So, where do you want to go first, Yugi?"

Yugi blushes as he looks down to the floor and thinks for a minute. He hardly remembers the last time he and Tea hang out, with just the two of them. When they do, it's mostly Yami that hangs out with her.

Yami...

Just thinking about him again makes his heart ache. He should be happy for him, but he never loses a friend so close to him, and not just literally.

Tea looks down at Yugi with worried eyes, "Yugi?"

The short boy snaps out of thought and looks up at her taller friend. He looks down again with hands behind his back, blushing once more, "Well, um, how about we go see a movie together?" His reddened face gets even darker by the minute.

Tea smiled and nodded, "Sure."

* * *

><p>Yugi and Tea went to the movie theater and watched a romantic, action, comedy. They laughed during the comedy parts, they were mind-blown through the explosive action scenes, and through the kissing scenes, Tea held Yugi in jovial tears. Being wrapped around in the girl's arms made Yugi blush hard again. He's lucky they're sitting in the back row alone, or else people would be staring, making him even more embarrassed.<p>

After the movie, they went upstairs and discovered a futuristic-looking arcade. The games there are modern, and one of them happens to be an arcade demo version of the latest video game, Super Smash Brother Brawl. Even though the game is already released, they decided to keep the demo version out for those who wants to see how fun them game is before they buy an original copy, and Yugi and Tea are one of those people.

The demo version is a 2-player game, so Yugi and Tea decided to try it out. When they got there turn, they select there own characters to fight one another. Yugi chose a psychic boy named Lucas, and Tea picked a beautiful princess named Peach.

As they spent two minutes fighting each other in a battlefield, Tea won against Yugi by one K.O. point. Yugi wanted to congratulate her, but he was already too embarrassed as a group of boys from behind snickered at him because he just got beat by a princess.

When they left the arcade, Yugi and Tea got hungry and went back downstairs to eat at the food court.

When they finished eating, they decided to do a little shopping **(and by "a little", I mean "A LOT")**. Yugi didn't mind shopping for about an hour with Tea. They tried on some new clothes, made agreements and disagreements on what or what NOT to wear.

* * *

><p>It's now 7:00 in the afternoon. When the sun went down, chandeliers turns on automatically, like street lights. The mall will always be given lighting through the dark, whether it's daytime or nighttime.<p>

An elevator elevated down to the first floor, and when it opens, it revealed Yugi and Tea standing inside. They each holding two shopping bags in their hands, but Tea's bags are bigger and heavier-looking.

Yugi looked down at her bags with concern, "Hey, Tea, is it really necessary to buy_ that_ much clothes?"

"You seriously have a lot to learn about our gender, Yugi," she responded.

"Well, anyway, I should probably get back home," said Yugi as they both walked of the elevator, "I gotta get home for dinner in twenty minutes."

After they walked out, they looked up at the chandeliers.

"Wow! Look at the chandeliers, Yugi!" The lights made Tea's eyes sparkle.

"Yeah! I'm liking this fancy touch to this mall."

Before they headed towards the exit, Tea takes a look at the food court and spotted a familiar person sitting in a table alone, sipping on a drink. The person is a blonde woman wearing a white shirt under a purple jacket with a matching skirt and matching sleeves. She has on black boots and a black pouch strapped around her left thigh.

"Hey, is that Mai?" wondered Tea.

"Huh? Where?" asked Yugi.

Yugi looks to the direction to where Tea just pointed to. The spike-haired boy spotted the same blonde lady, "Hey, maybe that is her. But the last time we saw her, we saved her, you, and the others from the Orichalcos. After that, we haven't heard much of her. Come on, let's go see."

"Okay."

The teenagers walked to the food court. They walked close to the table where the woman is sitting.

"Hey, Mai?" The woman paused her drinking and turned to face two teens walking towards her while carrying shopping bags in their hands.

The purple-eyed woman blinked and responded, "Yugi? Tea?"

The said teens smiled as she remembered her.

"Hey! Long time, no see!" said Tea.

"How are you doing?" asked Yugi.

"Fine," she replied quietly as she sips her drink.

Tea stares at the blonde in concern. She and Yugi both understands what she's one through. She joins this biker gang which turned out to be a group of soul stealers whose boss is a 10,000-year-old, originally good evil king with goals to bring back Atlantis, overthrow the Pharaoh, and rule the world. Yami, Joey, and Kaiba managed to stop that evil mastermind and saved the victims, including Mai. The evil king, known as Dartz, become good again and lived forever in peace with his daughter and father.

After Mai's soul was saved, the gang hasn't heard much from her since. They understand what she's gone through; loneliness, despair, neglect during her childhood, and others.

Not wanting to mention those terrible memories to Mai, Tea decided to speak positively, "So, uh, this mall looks pretty cool, huh, Mai?"

"It's alright, I guess," Mai shrugged. "I looked at some nice gems at the jewelry department and some perfumes at the beauty section."

"Well, it's good to see you again, Mai," said Yugi. Yugi's not sure if Mai is happy to see them again. But she's always been so alone. Why wouldn't she be happy? "We thought, maybe, you could use some company, since you seem to be by yourself."

"Thanks, Yugi. Congratulations on winning that third tournament, by the way."

Yugi and Tea gave a surprised look. Tea responded, "You mean the KC Grand Championship?"

"Yeah. I watched the last duel between Yugi and that purple-headed kid from the big screen on one of the buildings."

"Oh! Well, thanks." Just then, a ringtone sounded out from Yugi's left pants pocket. "Oh, hang on a sec," Yugi dropped the bag on his left hand and used that hand to dig into the pocket. After he grabbed something metallic, he pulled it out to reveal a purple cellphone in his hand.

Yugi's grandpa bought him a new cellphone for finally doing better after getting rid of that nightmare. He bought him a purple one because it matches the same color as Yugi's favorite Duel Monsters card: The Dark Magician.

Yugi flips open the phone, pressed the call button, and answered, "Hello? Oh, hey, Joey!"

Mai gasped before looking at the boy after she heard that name.

"What's that?" Yugi continues, "What? Really? No way! Yes, but- Ok, I'll- Yes I- Yeah, I'll tell the others. Ok, bye." He closed his phone and puts it back in his pocket.

"What did Joey want, Yugi?" Tea asked.

Yugi frowned, "Oh, I wish I have time to tell you, but I really need to get home for dinner."

"You know," Mai spoke up as she takes a sip of her drink again, "I guess I could give you two a ride. I t should be quicker than just walking."

Yugi and Tea was surprised, but in a happy way. Yugi asks, "Wow, thanks, Mai!"

Mai faces the teens, smiling, "Well, consider it as a returned favor for saving me and my other friends' souls from the Orichalcos." The blonde then gave them a sassy wink.

* * *

><p>Yugi had made it to his house after a car ride from Mai two hours ago. He made it in time for dinner with his grandpa. They had a nice dine. They talked and shared laughs the entire time. His grandpa made gooey cinnamon rolls for dessert. Yugi told him that was one of the best treats he ever made.<p>

Yugi is currently in his room, trying to set up his game helmet. When he unboxed it, it was only the helmet, a manual, and some pieces of Styrofoam still remaining in the box, some were scattered around his bed along with the helmet just sitting there. When Joey called, he told Yugi that he and Tristan travelled into a virtual reality world, which is the world of Super Smash Brothers. They dressed up as their favorite characters and battled tons of enemies.

The spike-headed teen reads the manual, "Let's see. The instructions say that you must find a safe place to lay your body down while you activate your gaming helmet."

**"Ok. Got it,"** Tea's voice is heard from the house phone lying next to Yugi's helmet. The phone is on speaker. **"And next, when you find a safe environment, put the helmet on and activate it by turning on the 'On' button located at the back of the helmet."**

"Ok," Yugi picks up the helmet. The portable machine is actually quite lighter than it looks. He rotated the helmet to see the back. When he does, he sees a small button with a green activation symbol on it. Yugi wonders if that's all they have to do. "So, when you put on the helmet and turn it on, what happens next?"

Tea speaks as if she is reading the manual from _her _helmet, **"'After you put on your helmet and activate it, you will be given 10 seconds to lay your body on a bed or on a comfortable surface. After 10 seconds, your mind will connect to the game, leaving your body on Sleep Mode. Once your mind enters the game, your mind cannot go back to your body until you log off.' You got that, Yugi?"**

"Yes," Yugi nodded, "So, our bodies won't operate again until we log off the game?"

**"Exactly."**

"Um, okay." _I have a weird feeling about this,_ he thought worriedly. "Okay, I'll meet at the game with the others, Tea."

**"Okay, Yugi. See you soon!" **

After Yugi ends the call, he removes everything off his bed and set them on his desk. He then sits on his bed and tries to put on the helmet. He was very surprised that he managed to fit all of that big, spiky hair into that thing. Yugi wraps behind his chin with the strap of the helmet.

"Ok, here goes nothing," he said to himself. He reaches to the back of the helmet and pressed the button, making the symbol glow light-green. Finally, he lays his body flat on his bed. Black visors appeared in front of Yugi's eyes. He sees a countdown running on the top-right corner.

"Countdown initiated," said a female computer voice as she starts counting, "10, 9, 8, 7..."

Yugi hopes for the best that nothing goes haywire.

"...6, 5, 4..."

_I really hope this will end well,_ he thought nervously.

"3, 2, 1."

After the countdown, nothing happened.

"What?" Yugi said surprisingly, "Hmm, I guess mine was a d-" Before he has a chance to finish talking, his eyes widened to a ding sound before slowly closing all the way down, leaving his mind blurry.

**FINALLY! I finally got this chapter done! Now, before you guys start asking, let me explain some details in this chapter. The reason I'm explaining about what happened on season 4 is because I'm posting this story as both a regular fic and a crossover, and some people may not know everything that happened in the show. ALSO, believe it or not, I did not get the virtual helmet idea from "Sword Art Online", I actually came up with it before I've heard of that anime. And no, they will not be trapped in the game, they get to log off anytime. I'll probably edit this chapter sometime. Bye! ;)**


	7. Chapter 7

**(I really need more reviews for support, guys. I'll probably edit this chapter later. Thank you.)**

His mind went blank for a few seconds. He started to hear warping sounds. He opens his eyes slowly, he blinked a couple of times. When he came to his senses, Yugi found himself warping through a portal. When his eyes shot open, he started screaming. His mouth became big and wiggly like a cartoon, and his eyes got as big and round as fine china. His arms and legs were spread out wide.

Yugi continues to warp through the purpled-striped, blue portal. As he finally stops screaming like 6-year-old, he calmed down and spotted a bright light at the end of the portal.

"I wonder where _that_ leads to," he said to himself, slightly panicky.

As he reaches the light, everything went blank again. Yugi looked around and sees nothing. He's just floating there, in a world of nothingness.

"Um, hello?" His voice echoed throughout the area. He still looks around, wondering if someone or something else is around. Nothing.

_Ok, now I'm starting to get a little worried,_ he thought, _I really hope I don't end up getting stuck out h-_

Just then, a screen popped up in front of him, making him jump. The screen shows the faces of all the characters, even the unlockable ones.

**"CHOOSE YOUR CHARACTER!"**

A booming male voice from scared the living Kuriboh out of Yugi, making him freeze a little.

"Um, OK," the spike-haired boy replied nervously. He carefully looks at the characters on the screen. Each face of a character has their names typed below them. The ones he see are a man with a mustache named Mario, a yellow mouse named Pikachu, a person in a metallic suit named Samus, a pink, puffball-like creature named Kirby, and so many more.

He noticed that a few characters' faces are blacked-out. Yugi figured that those are the characters that has already been taken. He noticed that one of them looked like the girl Tea used against him in the arcade demo. Because Yugi never played Nintendo games, he never heard of any of these all-star players. He remembered that one time that Joey told that he needs to relax for once and have a life. That was after the last time they've seen the Pharaoh. Yugi shook his head as he tries not to remind himself of sad, last good-byes again and focused more on the screen before him.

"Ok, let's see what character I want." Yugi takes a look at the available characters. He can tell that this activates like a touchscreen. After searching for a moment, he spotted the one that he used on the demo against Tea: a blonde child named Lucas.

Lucas is a character from a game series called "Earthbound". He and another boy named Ness, who's also in "Brawl", use superpowers based off of Psychokinesis, or "PK" for short. Yugi liked this character because Yami can perform mind tricks as well. Yugi thought it wouldn't hurt to do some mind moves of his own. He pressed his finger on Lucas's face.

**"LUCAS!"** The same voice boomed again.

An "Are You Sure?" screen popped up in front of the first screen. There is a "Yes" on the top and a "No" below it. Yugi touched the "Yes".

After making his choice, both of the screens disappeared. Next, glowing, multicolored ribbons appeared out of nowhere and wrapped in the form of a giant sphere around Yugi. He looked around the colored, closed environment nervously. Just then, the sphere disappeared, along with him.

* * *

><p>Yugi was unconscious once more. He opens his eyes again. This time he sees a big, blue sky with clouds scattered around. He then realized that he is laying on his back. He propped himself. He also stretches a little.<p>

He looks down at what he's standing. He seems to be standing on some kind of a small floating platform. He looks down and sees two more platforms below, they are both identical to the one he's standing on.

"Whoa. Where am I?" Said the short teen to himself. He hopped down from the top platform to the right lower ones. When he did, he sees a larger platform below. But, that stage is different. It seems to be made of earth. It has a lane on the middle with glowing markings and circles on it through the entire stage. He sees a sundial behind the lane. He also spotted a small tree behind the sundial, and some stone pillars scattered around them, resembling ruins.

The boy turned around and stood on the edge of the floating stage. Off in the distance, he sees a sea of water, mountain ranges, and open fields below his area. The sea glistens with dots of sparkles from the shining sun. He looks at the scenery in amazement, "Wow, I must say, this place is beautiful!"

Just then, he heard slow, clopping footsteps walking towards him from behind.

"Hey! Yugi!" Yugi noticed that it was Tea's voice.

He happily turns his back to see her, "Hey, Te-" His eyes shrunk and his jaw dropped as he looked at Tea, but in a different attire. She's wearing a beautifully royal, pink dress with a blue crest on her chest. She has on white gloves, blue pearl earrings, and a lovely, jewel-encrusted crown on top of her head. When Yugi saw her, he sees colorful sparkles in the background.

"How cool is it o be in a virtual world?" she asks.

Yugi only froze there for a moment. He shook his head and stammered, "Uh- uh, p-pretty nice, I dress- I MEAN 'GUESS'! Yes, I totally mean 'guess'," his face quickly turned as red as a tomato.

At first, Tea looked confused, but then she giggled in amusement, "I'm guessing you're liking the dress?"

"Um, not that I was looking at it, it's just that-"

She giggled again, "It's fine that you like my dress, Yugi. I'm dressed as Peach, the princess I picked in that demo this morning. And I see that you're using the same character you use as well."

Yugi stopped blushing as she points a gloved finger to his attire. He looked down and realized that he is also wearing something different. He wears a shirt with red and yellow stripes. He also wears a pair of jean short, along with red shoes with yellow laces and yellow tips on them.

"Hey, I'm dressed as my character, too!"

"You sure are! So, do you remember what your player does?"

He looks up to her, "What do you mean?"

"I mean what type of moves does he use in combat?"

"Oh! I'm dressed as Lucas! He's one of those kids who uses psychokinesis."

A question mark appeared above her head and she raises an eyebrow, "Psychoki-what?"

Yugi starts explaining, "It's a type of mind movement. But instead of moving objects with your mind at will like telekinesis, psychokinesis, or PK for short, allows you to control or create certain elements, such as ice, fire, and thunder."

"Oh! That's pretty cool! _My_ character lives in a castle at a place called the Mushroom Kingdom. Her servants are these little mushroom people called Toads. She basically gets kidnapped by this evil, fire-breathing turtle named Bowser like literally a gazillion times. Then, she gets rescued by a short, Italian plumber named Mario and he beats Bowser. I always thought that was really romantic."

When she mentioned Mario, Yugi remembered the man with a mustache and a red cap on. "That's really interesting! How do you know about that stuff, Tea?"

"I've done some research on my computer after Mai dropped _me_ off, while you were having dinner."

"Oh. Okay, then! So what do you thi-"

Before Yugi could finish, a type of soldier came out of nowhere behind Tea and had her in a hold with both of his arms.

"Tea!" Yugi called out her name in shock.

The soldier spoke in a deep, raspy voice, "Alright, Princess, just admit that Tristan Taylor would make a better boyfriend for Serenity Wheeler than Duke Devlin, and no one gets hurt."

Tea yelled, "Hey! Let get of m-" She blinked in surprise, "Wait, what?"

A big sweat drop glide down Yugi's face, "Tristan, is that you?"

The soldier's face popped up. It is Tristan. "Hey, guys! Good to finally see you here." His face was hidden behind Tea's head.

"Um, good to see you too, Tristan," said Tea. "Now, could you let go of me please?"

Tristan looks at the irritation on Tea's face and a seat drop glided down his face. "Oh, sorry, Tea," he said nervously as he lets go her.

When she turned, Yea and Yugi checks out Tristan's outfit. He's wearing a blue-ish silver sneaking suit with black camouflage patterns, along with matching boots, gray gloves, and a dark utility belt/vest wrapped around him. He also has on a ninja headband tied around his forehead, with its long ties blowing with the wind. Finally, he's equipped with elbow guards and knee guards matching with the suit's color. The tall teen stood proudly with his arms crossed, smiling.

"Wow, Tristan. I'm loving your costume already," Yugi complimented.

"Thanks, Yuge."

"So, who are _you_ supposed to be?" asked Tea.

"Well, if you must know, I'm Solid Snake from the "Metal Gear" series. He's basically a combination of a spy, mercenary, and spec ops agent. He has kung-fu-like skills, speaks 6 other different languages, and uses weaponry in combat, and his main task is to disarm a bipedal nuclear weapon-armed mecha called the Metal Gear."

"Whoa! That sounds like a really cool character, Tristan," said Yugi.

Tea smiled, "Yeah!"

"Well, if you think _this_ bozo's costume looks cool, then you guys ain't seen nuthin' yet." The trio heard a familiar, Brooklyn accent from behind Tristan. As Yugi and Tea looks over Tristan's sides, Tristan looks over his shoulder. They see a young, blonde man with ears like an elf walking their way. Yugi and Tea gawked at his attire with dropped jaws. Neither of them even bothered to notice that the morning blue sky changed into a sunset orange.

He wears a white shirt under a green tunic. He also wears a pair of tights matching the color of his shirt and a stocking cap on his head that matches his tunic's color. He has on a brown belt to tighten his tunic, a sheath strapped behind his back, arm guards around each arm, and a pair of brown, knee-high boots.

He carries a blue shield with mystical markings and a golden, triangular symbol engraved on it with his right hand, and with his left hand, he carries a double-edged, two-handed sword with a hexagonal cross-section. It has a purple, curved cross-guard in the shaped of a pair of wings with a small, yellow jewel on it. Yugi and Tea continued to look at the warrior. Yugi was the first to comment, "Joey?"

The blonde swordsman smiled and replied, "In the real world, I'm known as Joey Wheeler, Duel Monsters Champion. But here; you may address me as Link, the Hero of Time!" He swinged his sword around in style, causing his cap blow to from the wind.

Yugi and Tea had no idea what to say. Joey's outfit seem to be the coolest one they've ever seen, other than Tristan's. Though, Yugi still liked Tea's dress because she looked pretty in it.

"Joey," Tea spoke, "Aside from Tristan's suit, your costume is one of the best I've ever seen! What do you think, Yugi?" She looked back at the short teenager.

"I agree," he nodded. "Both of your outfits look really cool, especially yours, Joey."

"Thanks, guys," said Joey.

Tristan glared at the blonde in jealousy and turned to face him, "Oh, yeah, sure. Wearing a skirt can _really _make a guy popular." He smirks.

A vein popped in the angered blonde's forehead, "First of all, doofus: it's called a tunic; and second: you're just jealous 'cause my fans there likes my getup more than yours."

Tristan's smirk morphed into a bitter scowl, "Sure. Whatever you say, Fairy Boy."

Joey's mope deepens, "My character is Link!"

Link is a young, time-traveling swordsman whose task is to protect a mystical land called Hyrule from evil. Just like with Mario, Link often rescue the Hyrulian princess, Zelda, from her kidnapper, Ganondorf, an evil warlord and Link's major foe, who plans to take over the world. Link bears a powerful relic called the Triforce of Courage, which is the golden triangle engraved on Joey's shield and arm guard. He uses the Triforce to fend off against Ganondorf and any other evil.

In Super Smash Brothers Brawl, Link uses a variety of powerful weapons. He fights enemies with bombs, a grappling hook, a shield, a bow-and-arrows, the Gale Boomerang, and the Master Sword.

The Gale Boomerang is a special boomerang that can drag enemies and items as it comes back to the tosser. The Master Sword, also known as the "Blade of Evil's Bane", is a magical sword that has the power to overcome magic dark powers. Link often uses this sword to repel Ganondorf and other evil beings with dark powers.

A little fairy named Navi helps Link with his quest to stop evil. She guides him through areas and tough situations.

Finally, Link uses a magic instrument called the Ocarina of Time. He uses the ocarina to travel through time, alter time, and even manipulate time.

Tristan gives Joey another annoying smirk, "Fairy boy in a skirt is more likely your name."

"It's called a tunic an' da name is Joey- I mean Link- I mean..." Joey's face turns red, "My name is not 'Fairy Boy'!"

"Aww, is Fairy Boy getting upset?" Tristan said in a babyish voice.

"Hey, guys? Will you knock it off?" Tea protested.

"Tea's right," Yugi agreed, "I thought you guys would be more mature by now!"

"Well, if you guys would like ta see some maturity, then you'll love to see us settle this like men!"

Tristan scoffed, "Oh, you wanna brawl again, Wheeler?"

"You bet your camouflaged butt I do, Ninja Dork!"

"Well, I'd rather be called 'Ninja Dork' than 'Fairy Boy', Fairy Boy!"

Joey's face became crimson-hot and his eyes became blank, **"OK, YOU KNOW WHAT!" **

The boy started to scream at each other. Joey said some things that shouldn't be said around a girl, specifically Tea. Yugi and Tea sweatdrops at the immaturity.

Tea turn to Yugi, "Well, so much for maturity."

"Yeah. They're fighting over a video game like a couple of ten-year-olds. Now I see why you need more female friends."

Tea giggled in response. They continued to talk, ignoring the loud screaming from Joey and Tristan in the background.

"So, Yugi," Tea spoke, "You're officially done with that same nightmare?"

He happily nodded, "That dream's been gone for so long, I just started to forget all about it."

"That's great." Tea felt the urge to talk more about the Pharaoh, but she can tell that Yugi doesn't want to be reminded of that. So, in her mind, she decided to change the subject. "By the way, did you tell Bakura and Duke to check in?"

"I did, but they said they're too busy tonight. They said that they'll try out their helmets tomorrow."

"Oh. Ok, then."

"Well anyway, Tea, you wanna see those two fight as brawlers for real?"

"Well actually," Tea answered slowly, "I've got something else in mind."

The answer stunned Yugi and he asked as slowly, "Um, and what's that?"

"Fairy Boy!"

"Ninja Dork!"

"Skirt Wearer!"

"Guy Who Serenity'll Never Like!"

"**WHAT!? **You take that back!"

Joey and Tristan continued their bickering. The two growl loudly as a flash of blue spark connected their angry eyes.

"Hey, guys?" The boys stopped their bickering and turned to Tea. "Me and Yugi were thinking about watching you guys fight, but..."

"'But' what?" Said the blonde sword-wielder, "So you guys can find a stage to have a date in peace?"

"No!" Yugi blushed a little. "We were thinking about battling with you guys."

In surprise, Joey and Tristan exchanged looks before they burst into guffaws, "PBFT-HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!"

A vein popped behind Tea's head as another drop of sweat appeared behind Yugi's. With on hips, the offended brunette-in-a-dress asked, "And what is so funny?"

The boys took their time to stop laughing for a moment. As he rubs the back of his head, Joey said, "Sorry, guys. It's just dat we don't think dat we, da experts, should take on a couple-a newbies."

"Yeah. Especially with one of them who looks like a drama queen, and the other looking like a ten-year-old, as if he doesn't already," added Tristan as they both continue to laugh a little.

"Hey!" Yugi yelled. "Just because we just got here doesn't mean we can't play!"

Tea agreed, "Yugi's right! We'll just study our movesets, that's all!"

Tristan stopped laughing, "Ok, ok. If you wanna know what your movesets are, just hold up your wrist like this," he holds up his right wrist as demostrated, "then, a device that can be worn like a wristwatch is gonna appear." A white band woth a small, neon-glowing half a ball mounted on top materialized around the same wrist. Yugi and Tea gasped as the glowing ball projects a holographic menu screen.

Tristan continued to explain, "When this screen comes up, it guides you to some curtain info, such as your character's bio and movesets. C'mon, give it a try."

The two "newbies" exchanged looks before holding up their wrists. After three seconds, the bands appeared around their wrists. Yugi can see his character's information option on top of the screen. He sees a "Log Off" option at the bottom. He can also see a gray up, down, and "SELECT" button underneath the projecting ball.

_Hmm, _Yugi thought, _this is pretty interesting._

**(I've done some research on the information about the Super Smash Brothers characters' histories. The reason they are explained is because this is also a regular story for Yu-Gi-Oh. So people who doesn't play video games probably doesn't know these characters. Next chapter will probably be a lot shorter. REVIEW/FAVE/FOLLOW! Bye!)**


	8. Chapter 8

**AN: Hey, guys, TCC here. I just want to say that I really appreciate you guys for giving me some extra support, and the courage to keep writing this fic. I will try my very best to make this story worth to read. Also, this chapter contains the first action scene, so tell me what you think about it. Have fun!**

When the gang materialized into the same world of nothingness Yugi has been in, this time, they find themselves levitating in front of a ginormous screen. Yugi and Tea already studied their own set of normal and special moves.

Yugi can perform moves based on psychokinesis. He can also use a stick as a weapon. Tea's weapons are turnips, a parasol, a golf club, a tennis racket, and a frying pan. She can counter attacks with little mushroom-headed creatures called Toads.

"So, you two done studyin'?" Joey asked Yugi and Tea.

Yugi responded, "Yep. I think we've studied enough."

"Me too," said Tea, "but, there's something I should've asked you guys before: Me and Yugi aren't the fighting types in real life. So-"

Tristan interrupts by explaining, "We know; you're not fighters. But to play this game in virtual reality, you don't need to be."

Yugi asks confusingly, "What do you mean, Tristan?"

Joey explains, "What he means is, when your mind is in the game and you select your characta', there's gonna be some fighting data 'dat'll be stored into your brain. When it does, it'll be as if you've been fighting like your characta' your entire life."

Tea gasps, "So, what you're saying is, we don't have to do _any_ training to fight like a warrior?"

"Yeah", Tristan said, "but keep in mind that it won't affect you in real life. You'll still be the same pushovers that we all know and love in reality."

The boy in childlike clothes and the teen girl dressed as a princess glared daggers at Tristan, trying to wear fake smiles "Gee, thanks," they said irritably in unison.

The gang looks at the big screen, On it, there is a menu screen. The selections are "Group", "Solo", "Wi-fi Connection", and some minor options.

"All right, time ta start 'dis baby up," declared Joey as a Wii remote appeared his right hand. He holds the controller horizontally and uses the game pad and the other buttons to scroll and select. Yugi and Tea watch Joey going from screen to screen. He eventually stopped at a screen of rows of selectable Brawl stages. "Okay, guys. I've already set the rules to a 2-minute free-for-all."

The default timer is 2 minutes, a player can set the timer at anytime from 1 to 99 minutes, or infinite. They can also set the type of brawl to free-for-all, coin collection, teams, etc.

Tea asked, "What's the free-for-all?"

"Whoeva gets da most K.O. points when da timer runs out is da winner," Joey answered.

"Now all we have to do is pick a place to battle on," said Tristan before facing the "newbies". "Since you two are new, you guys get the first pick."

The said teenagers exchange looks. Yugi said, "What do you think, Tea? Only one of us can pick an area. Would you like to pick one?"

"Nah, you go ahead and pick a place, Yugi. I really don't mind. And besides, you had a really great time all day, after being in a lot of stress. I just wanted you to stay happy."

Yugi smiled and nodded, "Ok, Tea." Yugi can hear the teasing kissing noises coming from the guys, but he decided to ignore it. Tea has always been such a caring and comforting friend, especially to Yugi. After missing the Pharaoh and having that same nightmare over again, she tries to give him as much comfort as she can.

Yugi looks at the giant screen, narrowing his eyes at the most interesting-looking stages he could find. He can tell that some of these stages has been unlocked. He may not have played video games that much in the past, but he knows that there can only be a few stages when playing it in a memory file for the first time, same with the characters.

He sees a **"RANDOM"** selection at the bottom of the screen, just in case the chooser can't decide. He looks up at the first stage on the top row. That stage was the same place that Yugi and Tea first appeared in. He thought about choosing that one, but, he decided to try someplace new, someplace... simpler for a beginner. He quickly found that type of stage.

Right beside the first stage, there is a blue, flat platform floating in the middle of outer space. It looks almost like the floating platform Yugi always stand on in his nightmares. Even though he doesn't want to choose that one because it reminds him of the dream, at the same time, he _does _want to because he wants to start things off on the simplest area.

"How about that one," Yugi pointed to the stage, "the second stage on the top row?"

Joey moves the cursor up to the said stage. He then moves the cursor in front of the image, "Dis one? The Final Destination?"

"Yep."

A thought popped into Tristan's brain, "Oh, yeah! Remember this, guys: when you get hit, your mind will trick you into thinking you could feel it, like with a sword, fire, anything that can kill you in real life, it won't kill you here."

"Um, ok. Good to know," said Tea, unsure about that. She remembers the time she and everyone else got trapped inside Kaiba's stepbrother's virtual world. She remembered when she was attacked by a clan of Hitotsu-Me Giants, she got hit in the face by a splinter when one of them threw a boomerang. She also remembered that one time she and Yugi were in a glacier level, they felt like they were going to freeze to death. It turns out that their minds were tricking them into feeling things that weren't really there.

Joey announces, "Alright! Final Destination, it is! Get ready, guys." The blonde boy pressed the "2" button on the controller. The four teens virtually disappeared as the screen turned dark and started to load.

* * *

><p>The gang appeared on the stage in their own ways: Yugi was dropped off by a walking surf board. Tea appeared with an open parasol in her hand while surrounded by cherry blossoms. Joey popped out of a small tornado while he withdraw his Master Sword out of his sheath. Tristan appeared on his hands and knees as he slowly props himself of the ground, and while he was covered with static electricity.<p>

The platform they were sent on is one of the few stages that has no environmental hazards. The area itself is not too large, but large enough for up to 4 people to beat each other up. Its surface is hexagonal-shaped with a rectangular alley in the middle and two pentagonal fence frame floors on the sides. It has a large diamond-shaped pattern on the middle with corresponding arrows matching its angles surrounding it. Walls are placed underneath the ledges, for those who can wall-climb and/or wall cling. A red diamond rotates inside the fighting arena's undercarriage, adding more decoration to the stage.

After Yugi got off the surf board before it vanished, he looked around. He sees nothing but a galaxy, filled with colored aura. He looks up and discovered up across the sky, four damage percentages, featuring everyone's characters' names, faces, and symbols. Each percentage starts of with 0%. There's also the 2-minute timer above the percentages.

Joey and Tristan had already taught Yugi and Tea about the basics of how to win or lose: knock your enemies off the screen, and in this match, whoever knocks his or her opponents off the screen the most by the time the countdown ends is the winner.

They also taught them that there will be random items spawning during battle. Joey decided to have this battle** without** any items (because Tristan keeps destroying him with the Smash Ball every game). They didn't tell them what items are there or what they do, however. They wanted to surprise them for later brawls.

Yugi and Joey stood near the far edges of the plateau while Tea and Tristan stood in the middle. They're all away from each other in equal distances.

"Okay, guys," Joey speaks out to the newcomers, "remember what we taught you."

Tea turned to Yugi. She stands between Yugi and Tristan while Tristan is ready to take on Joey. "Remember this Yugi," Yugi took his eyes off the sky and looked at Tea, "don't go easy on me because I'm a girl in a pretty dress", she said in a soft voice. "Neither of us will feel anything, so give me your best shot ok?"

Yugi didn't think that he would have to fight Tea. But since no one really gets hurt in a virtual world, he smiled and nodded in agreement, "Ok, Tea. I won't hold back."

* * *

><p>Out of nowhere that same booming voice Yugi heard before kicked in, <strong>"Ready?"<strong>

Suddenly, a giant, square barrier materialized around the stage. Joey already told Yugi and Tea that this barrier appears around the stage during any battle. If anyone goes through the barrier, they are removed from the screen. People from the outside of the game cannot see these, only people playing in the game in perspective can.

"I am _real_ ready to kick your butt again, Joey," said Tristan, cracking his knuckles and popping his neck muscles, making sickening cracks and pop sounds in the process.

"We'll see about that, tough guy," replied Joey, swinging his blade around in style. "Alright, we're ready, game!"

**"GO!" **After the announcement, the 2-minute timer started the countdown.

Tristan makes the first move, he lunge towards Joey. Joey blocks the agent's attack with his Triforce-engraved shield. He then knocks Tristan away, making him fall flat on his back onto the hard, blue floor.

As he lifts his head up, Tristan sees Joey leaping up in the air and throws the Gale Boomerang at him, making a small cyclone surrounding it with its powerful spins. Tristan reacted quickly and rolls to the right to dodge that attack. The male brunette catapults himself off the floor and onto his feet before wrestling the blonde sword-wielder.

Yugi and Tea watches the fighting duo from the other side of the stage. Tea turned to face Yug. She says worriedly, "Are you absolutely sure you're ready to do this, Yugi?"

"Um, yeah, I guess," he shrugged before closing his eyes.

"Well good..."

Just then, Yugi's eyes shot his eyes open as he felt a hand grabbed his shirt, "Huh?" He looked up to see that it's Tea's hand grabbing the clothing. He whimper at the sight of her face, it turned from an innocent look into a dark smile.

Tea pulls Yugi off the ground, and threw him at the other boys like a rag doll. The wrestling teen boys heard someone screaming, the looked to the scream's direction and sees Yugi flying towards them, doing the screaming. Before they had time to react, Yugi hits Tristan, causing them both to tumble almost near the ledge.

The very surprised Joey looks at Tea and said, "Woah! Tea, did'ju do that?!"

She giggled, "Sorry, boys," she said in a sing-song voice, "I guess I just don't know my own strength."

"Hmm," he smiled, "well if you're capable of doin' that, then I won't have a problem doing dis!" He dashes toward the "princess", with his sword ready for striking as he starts a battle cry.

After recovery from harsh contact, Tristan was the first prop himself up. Yugi ended up on his bottom, he rubs his head and looks up at Tristan, "Sorry, Tristan," he apologized sheepishly as he extends his right hand for help off the ground.

Tristan smiled, "Don't worry, dude. No big deal." He grabs Yugi's hand with his own to help him up. But out of nowhere, Yugi grabs Tristan's arm with his other hand and performs a karate flip on him, making Tristan end up on his back yet again.

Tristan opens his eyes and looks up at the smaller boy standing proudly over his head. A vein popped in his head, "Not cool, dude."

"No,_ this_ is cool. PK Freeze!" Yugi yelled out an attack as he forms a snowflake in his hands. He uses his mind to move the snowflake upward, and then downwards to Tristan. As the snowflake got close enough to him, it bursts. When it did, the next thing he knew, Tristan finds himself frozen inside a huge block of ice. He could barely move, and he can only sound out muffles.

"Who's the pushover now?" Yugi smirked with his arms crossed. He pushes the ice with his foot. The block of ice slid to the edge and fell off the stage.

Before Tristan could break free, he passed through the barrier, exploding into colorful blasts.

That performance has gained Yugi 1 K.O. point. "Yes!" Yugi yelled in triumph before looking up at the scoreboard:

! minute and 12 seconds left on the timer. And for their damage percentages:

Yugi: 17%

Tea: 0%

Joey: 24%

Tristan: 0% (Because he just got knocked off the stage, resulting in damage reset)

Yugi turns around and sees Tristan coming back on stage on a flying saucer. The saucer levitated down and stopped about 8 feet from the floor. Tristan crossed his arms, "Alright, Moto, now let's see what else you're capable of." He hops off the saucer and leaps at Yugi with a karate yell.

"Oh, boy," said Yugi with another sweat-drop sliding down the back of his head.

Joey sprints at Tea. As he got close enough, he starts swinging his sword. Tea dodged every swing. with another battle cry, Joey then swings his sword at a 180 degree angle. Tea thought about stopping the blade with her hands clapped, but she had a better idea. She reached for her back and pulls out a small, childlike creature with a polka-dotted mushroom on his head. When the sword hit the creature, he unleashed a powerful force that pushed the wielder away.

Joey fell on his back. He's only been unconscious for a moment. When he lifts his head up, he came face-to-face with the head of a golf club. He drowsily looked up to see Tea gripping its handle. As he completely snapped back to reality, he yelled in a panic, "Woah! Tea, what are you-"

"Fore!" Tea swung her golf club back, and then she harshly swung it back to Joey's face, and then- _**Wham!**_

The blonde teen finds himself flying back towards Yugi, who is off his feet, being strangled by Tristan. Yugi was instantly out of Tristan's grasp when Joey slammed into him. The momentum was so hard, they both fell off the stage and went past through the barrier.

Tristan watched them explode into bright blasts just like he did. He looked up at the score and discovered that Tea had gained 2 points for knocking out the boys. He sees the timer, they have 43 seconds left and Tea is winning.

"Aw, great. Tea's winning," Tristan groaned. He looks at the brunette. As he gave a cocky smile, he got down on his left knee and pulled a two-handed rocket launcher from his back. He aimed his cursor at Tea.

"Huh?!" Tea exclaimed in fright.

With his target locked on, Tristan pulled the trigger. A small rocket shot out of the hole. Wasting no time she whips out another Toad. His powerful force blocked the rocket and destroyed it. Tristan placed his launcher away and dashed at the girl.

Yugi and Joey c ame back on stage on the same saucers Tristan was on. Yugi's on the left and Joey's on the right. A few seconds later the saucers vanished and the boys landed back on the floor behind Tea and Tristan, each with one knee on the floor. The two looked at each other. Joey smiled, "I gotta say; for dis bein your first battle, you two did pretty neat."

Yugi smiled, "Thanks, Joey"

Joey stood up and turns his back on the shorter teen. He secretly pulled out a black, spherical, lit bomb from his tunic. He snickered quietly, "Here. Let me congratulate ya- **WITH THIS!**"

He turns back around and yells as he threw the bomb at Yugi. With perfect timing, Yugi grabbed the bomb, causing Joey's grin to deflate.

"Sorry, Joey," Yugi says innocently, "but I think this 'present' is better off with you." He tossed the bomb back at the swordsman.

The explosive ball landed gently in his hands. The bomb glowed red after its wick disappeared into the bomb. Without thinking, as usually, Joey only yelled, "Hey! You can't just-" **BOOOM!**

Tristan whipped out a black grenade from his utility belt. He bit off the ring and threw it at Tea. She pulls out a third Toad and repeated the maneuver on the grenade. When the small bomb exploding, Tristan popped up behind Tea and had her in a chokehold. Tea tries to pry his arms, but his grip is too strong. Tea isn't really choking. Being inside a video game, Tristan can hold anyone's neck as tight as he could, but the victim can still breath.

"Heh. No escaping this time," said the "choker".

Instead of screaming in fear, Tea frowns in annoyance. She extends out her right arm. A frying pan magically appeared in her hand. Without any warning, **BANG! **Tristan was whacked in the head with the frying pan. He was whacked twice before losing his grip on Tea and fell onto the floor. Tristan sees nothing but stars in his sight. So much for not feeling anything in the game.

"PK Fire!" Yugi shoots a lightning bolt from his fingers. When the lightning bolt successfully hit Joey, it turned in to a pillar of flames around him, causing multiple damage.

Yugi looks up to see Joey's percentage. It rose up to 33%. He also glanced at the timer, they have 8 seconds left.

Yugi looks back at Joey, the flames around Joey disappeared. After recovering from the "fire-dance", Joey stood there, covered in soot and smoke. He huffed, "Alright, you asked for it!"

**"5!"**

Joey came at Yugi, swinging his sword at him. Yugi got hit a few times, but managed to dodge the other blows.

**"4!"**

Tristan leaps up in the air and tries to kick Tea's face. She quickly dropped down and rolled her body away to avoid the attack. When she stood back up while Tristan landed in a squatting position closely in front of her, he sweepkicked her off her feet from behind. She fell flat on her back.

**"3!"**

Joey decided to try a move called the Spin Attack. He holds his sword up horizontally and spins around at intense speed. He tries to make his sword come in contact with Yugi. As Yugi backs away, he looks down and see that Joey's spinning with only one foot. He pulls out a wooden stick from his back. Despite that they're in a video game, Yugi still don't understand how he and his friends keep getting weapons out of nowhere.

As he gets close enough, Yugi sweeps Joey's spinning foot off with the stick, causing him to land face-first onto the blue platform.

**"2!"**

Tristan lifts Tea off the ground by her armpits. As he held her up at face-length, she brings her knees to her chest and kicked him in the face, forcing him to put her down.

**"1!"**

With a final battle yell, Yugi charges at Joey while the blonde stood back up again, feeling a bit dizzy, and back-flipped away from him. Joey charges back at Yugi with a battle cry of his own. With Yugi's stick in hand, and Joey's sword in hand, the boys got close enough to each other and-

**"Time!"**

The 4 brawlers disappeared, no longer onstage.

* * *

><p>Yugi, Joey, Tea, and Tristan teleported on an ashy-white horizon. The color of the sky is a swirly mixture of blue, white, orange, purple.<p>

Joey and Tristan stood next to each other, Tea stood in front of the boys, and Yugi stood in the middle. Yugi asks, "Where are we, now?"

Tristan answered, "This is the place where which player is declared the winner or loser."

Joey sighed, "An' since me and Tristan didn't get ANY K.O. points, we got 3rd place."

"Oh, I see," said Yugi, "Since I only had one, I get 2nd place."

Tea added, "And since I have more points than you guys-"

The announcer spoke, **"Winner: PEACH!"**

An invisible crowd cheered, "PEACH! PEACH! PEACH! PEACH!"

Tea smiled wide, "I won!" She jumps around excitedly. "Woo-hoo! Yeah"

Yugi smiled, being proud of her.

"Remind us to never push these to their limits again," Tristan sighed heavily.

"Agreed," Joey sulked.

**(Finally! This chapter is done! I know I said that this chapter would be shorter, but, man, I had too many ideas for this action sequence. I know I should've mentioned the change of scenery in Final Destination, but the fighting was difficult enough to write. Again, this chapter was very difficult to write. ****I hope you guys would understand.**** Anyways, please review, favorite, and/or follow this story. Later!)**


	9. Chapter 9

**(NOTE: I've missed out on a little detail in the last chapter. In free-for-all mode, when a fighter is knocked offstage, he/she/it/they lose a point. Therefore, the results were actually, Yugi: 0 points, Tea: 2 points, Joey: -1 point, and Tristan: -1 point.) **

The gang teleported back to the Battlefield, the area were they all first met at in the game. The sky had turned into a midnight blue, sprinkled with stars and topped with clouds.

"Well," Tristan began while scratching the back of his head in displeasure, "that was an interesting match."

"And a bit disappointing," added Joey.

Tea smiles in a cocky fashion, "Why? 'Cause you guys got your butts kicked by a princess?"

"Your not even a real princess, Princess," Tristan countered.

"Oh, whatever. The point is, I totally won that battle fair and square!"

Joey crosses his arms, "Really? 'Cause it doesn't seem fair to toss a smaller person at somebody like a weapon," he turns to Yugi, "OR BLOW UP A WARRIOA' WITH HIS OWN BOMB!"

Yugi makes a disappointed face, "You were the one who tried to blow **me** up with your bomb in the first place, Joey."

"An' your point is...?"

The shortest teenager sighed deeply, "Forget it! Look, all it matters that we all had fun, right? It doesn't matter if you win or lose, it's that you play that counts. I only agreed to this to have fun, and I thought it would make all of us happy, and it made _me_ happy. So tell me, had playing this game as best friends made you guys happy?"

Tea, Joey, and Tristan's expressions dropped to neutral. They exchanged looks. They reminisced the hard times that Yugi had gone through earlier. With the times when he misses Yami, or the times when he doesn't get enough sleep because of the same nightmare, or the times when he nearly fell behind at school because of it. They were so focused on trying out their helmets or winning some match, the completely forgot the true reason for being here: to have a good time and to be happy. All Yugi wanted was to just hang out with his 3 closest friends.

They all frowned and looked back at the short teen. Tea said, "We're sorry, Yugi. We wanted to have a good time too, but we got carried away."

"Yeah, we didn't mean to make you feel bad," said Tristan, "especially when we treated you guys like amateurs."

Joey walks over and pets Yugi's shoulder, smiling, "Tell ya what; how 'bout we all come back here tomorrow, an' we'll introduce you two to 'Classic Mode' an' then 'Adventure Mode'?

Yugi smiled and nodded, "Sounds good, Joey. I'll call you when I have the time."

"Cool," Joey nodded back before looking back at Tea and Tristan. They smiled as well.

"Well, I guess I'll see you all tomorrow, then," Yugi holds up his wrist to make his wrist-wear device to appear. "Thanks for the fun match, you guys!"

His friends replied as they held _their_ wrists up:

"No problem, Yuge!"

"Anytime, Buddy!"

"See you tomorrow, Yugi!"

After a few seconds, the devices are wrapped around their wrists. They each pressed the down-arrow button to scroll down to the "Log Off" option at the bottom. They pressed "SELECT" on it and they all virtually disappeared from the Battlefield.

* * *

><p>Yugi finds himself warping through the same portal as he did to enter the game. Once again, he screamed his head off like a 6-year-old. Warping through this vortex could take some getting used to for him. At the end of the portal, he spots another light. As he reaches it, everything was once again blank.<p>

Everything became silent...

"..._Yugi_..."

He heard nothing, but a faint call.

"...Yugi..."

The voice has gotten closer.

"Yugi?"

The became more clear. It sounded like... Grandpa.

"Yugi! Wake up!"

Yugi opens his eyes. The visors before his eyes retracted back into his helmet. When he woke up, he realized that his grandpa has his hands on his shoulders and was shaking him.

Solomon said joyfully as he stopped, "Yugi! You're finally awake! I know that the cinnamon rolls I made might have made you sleepy, but-"

"Huh? Oh!" Yugi sat up. He explains while he attempts to remove his virtual helmet, "I wasn't sleeping, Grandpa. My mind was in the new video game, the one everyone was talking about." After taking off the strap, he took off the helmet, making his big spiky hair to spring up.

"Oh! I think Mokuba was saying something about those 'special' helmets."

Yugi blinked, "Mokuba?"

"He's on the phone right now," he held up a house phone. "I told him that you were 'asleep' right now, but he really needs to speak to you, as if it's very urgent."

"Hmm, urgent, huh? Give me the phone." After his grandfather hands the phone over to him, he speaks into it, "Hello, Mokuba? It's me, Yugi."

**"Hey, Yugi! How are you?"**

"I'm doing fine!" He smiled. "Me and Tea just tried out the helmets you gave us yesterday. They worked great!"

**"Oh, good! I was just about to talk to you about that! Did you try the Adventure Mode, yet?"**

"Hmm?" Solomon listens to the conversation, raising an eyebrow in confusion.

"Not yet. Joey just told me that he and Tristan are going to introduce us to that mode tomorrow! Bakura and Duke are gonna join us as well."

**"Cool! Me too!"**

"You have a helmet, too?"

**"Well, duh. My brother's one of the developers, remember?"**

A big drop of sweat went down Yugi's face, "Oh, right."

**"So, where do you want to meet?"**

"Um, I'm really not sure. What's the limit on how many people can be on one stage at once?"

**"Oh, yeah. Only up to four people can be on a stage at once. However, there is one special stage that over a hundred people can be on at once, and it's only available in the virtual helmet version."**

"Really? What is it?"

Mokuba sits on the couch in the living room. His brother Seto is at the desk, working on his computer. He speaks into his cellphone, "This special stage is called Smash City. It's a really big city that's big enough for over 10,000 players around the world. It's really cool!"

**"Huh! But how come Joey or Tristan never told us about it?"**

"Well, obviously because they don't know where it is. You need to enter in a password to have access to the city. You'll find the password screen on your Data Band."

**"Data Band?"**

"The item that appears around your wrist when you hold it up for 3 seconds. I'll give the code to you guys tomorrow."

**"Oh, okay. Sounds good. Hey, before we hang up, I have a question to ask. When I first arrived at the screen where you choose your characters, some of them were already taken. How-"**

"Uh, remember when I told you that the helmets are for testing? What I meant to say is, the helmets I gave to you guys are the demo versions, or prototypes. We're using those to test the systems before we can release the actual helmets. They all work the same. The only difference is that all characters and stages are already unlocked, but you can only choose what characters are left with the prototypes, and once you choose a character, it's your forever."

**"Um,** **if the helmets we're using are for demonstration, then shouldn't all the unlockable characters and stages stay _locked_?"**

"Um, well, yeah. But we figured why not just- uh. Umm..." Mokuba can't seem to find the right words to say.

Yugi is still sitting on his bed, not getting what Mokuba's trying to say. "Mokuba?

Mokuba's still trying to say something, but he immediately gave up. He responded, "Oh, look! There's a tunnel! We're about to get cut off! I'll have to call you tomorrow! Bye!"

Yugi heard Mokuba hang up, leaving him with a dead tone.

The bushy-haired boy closed his cellphone.

"Well, that went well," said the egotistical KaibaCorp president sarcastically, "especially with that lame-old, 'getting cut off by a tunnel' excuse."

The younger Kaiba heir sighed, " Well, I had to come up with **some** excuse. I didn't want to explain what's _really_ going down, or at least not yet."

"They're gonna have to know eventually." Seto kept his eyes on the computer. Mokuba could hear the endless sounds of typing on his brother's keyboard. "So, the geeks are going to try out the Adventure Mode?"

"Yeah. I told them that I''m gonna meet 'em in the game."

"Good." He thought, _Cause they're going to be in for quite a surprise._

* * *

><p>Yugi pressed the "End Call" button on his house phone. "Well, that was weird."<p>

Solomon asks, "What's this nonsense you boys were talking about, Yugi?"

Yugi had forgotten to explain the "special" helmets to his grandpa.

"Oh! I never told you, grandpa."

He raises an eyebrow again, "About what?"

"Well, it starts off with that new game..."

**(Please review! I need to know if there is ANY flaw that I need to take care of! I'm also gonna need some R&R. 'Til then, see ya!)**


	10. Chapter 10

Sunday, another sunny day at the game shop.

Grandpa Solomon stands behind his counter, as usual. Yugi stands on the other side of the counter, observing his game helmet.

Staring at Yugi's helmet on the counter, Solomon asks, "So, how does this doohickey work again?"

Yugi turns the helmet so his grandpa can see the back, "Well, it starts up just by pressing this green button." He points his finger to the button at the middle of the helmet's backside. "After you press it, visors will come out, and they show a countdown to 10. Then, the helmet transports your mind into the video game."

"Very intriguing," said Grandpa, rubbing his chin. "So that's all you really have to do?"

"Well, no. You first have to find a safe place to lay your body down while your mind is in the game."

"Oh! Well, in that case, mind if your Grandpa give it a try?" He tries to grab the helmet from Yugi, who pulled the helmet back just in time. "Huh?"

"Sorry, Grandpa, but I've already told you: I promised Mokuba and the others that I'd meet them in the game today."

"Oh, come on. Just for a minute, please?" Solomon's eyes sadden with beg.

"Later, Grandpa. I promise I'll let you give it a shot when I'm done, ok?"

Solomon sighed, eyes filled with disappointment, "OK," he moped childishly.

The two Motos heard the customer bell ringing as the front door opened. Yugi turned.

Gramps perked up as he looked up to see his best friend standing at the doorway, "Arthur!"

"Hello, Solomon, Yugi," greeted the nice, taller old man. Arthur wears his usual light-tan suit with his red bow tie. He walks through the hallway of items in shelves. "Good to see you."

"Good to see you too, Mr. Hawkins," greeted Yugi politely.

"So, what brings you here, old friend?"

"Me and Rebecca are visiting Domino City because we heard that they're having an Egyptian festival at the museum here next week," Arthur stands in front of Yugi.

"An Egyptian festival, you say?"

"I don't think I've ever heard of a festival like that before," said Yugi.

"Why, they just decided to organize it starting this year. Archeologists will be there to show their collections. They'll also be lots of fun activities relating to Egypt, such as Duel Monsters. I figured you two may want to join us there? Bring your friends, perhaps?"

"Why count me in then," Solomon said in interest.

Yugi smiled, "I wouldn't miss it for the world! I'll tell my friends about it later."

"By the way," Solomon asks, "where is your granddaughter, anyway?"

"Why, Rebecca is in the car right now. She's on her laptop, searching for decent contact lenses on the internet."

Yugi blinked, "On the internet?"

"Yes, the brand she wants can only be bought online. Anyway, she'll be here in just a-"

The door opened again, causing the bell to ring once more.

"YUUUUGIIII!" A shrill cry caused Yugi to stun in shock.

Rebecca stood at the doorway. She has her blonde hair in two pigtails, as always. She wears her usual oval-lensed glasses. She also wears a pick shirt with a matching skirt. Finally, she wears white stockings under a pair of red dress shoes.

A drop of sweat ran down Yugi's face, "Um, hi, Rebec-" He was cut off when he finds himself being constricted in the crazy blonde girl's arms by his chest.

She closes her eyes in joy, "Oh, Shmoopy! It's been so long! How've you been? Did you miss me? Why haven't you e-mailed me?"

While listening to her blabbering, Yugi was to breathless from her vice-grip grasp, making his turn blue. _Now I know what it's like to be attacked by a ferocious boa,_ he thought.

Ever since the gang met Rebecca for the second time, they discovered that she developed a big crush on Yugi. Now at times, she'd grab him and starts kissing him on the cheek, which makes Tea jealous. Yugi also remembered the time when she and Vivian Wong starts fighting over him during the tournament at KaibaLand.

"Rebecca, Please! Let the poor boy go. He can't breath," said Arthur, trying to pry his granddaughters arms off the blue-faced boy.

Just then, Yugi's phone started ringing inside his pocket. Yugi said suffocate breathlessly, "Um, Rebecca? Th-this phone call might be important. So, do you mind...?"

The short, blonde girl opened her eyes and let go, allowing the boy to breath again, "Oh, sorry, Yugi. I guess I got a bit carried away."

After taking in a few long breaths, he responded, "It's fine, Rebecca." He pulled out his purple cellphone and answered, "Hello? Mokuba? Ok, great. I'll be there in a few minutes. Later." He hangs up his phone and put back in his pocket. He turns to the counter and grabbed his helmet, "Ok, Grandpa, I'll be in my room."

"What? But what for?" Rebecca asked.

He looks back at her. "Oh, well, I-"

His grandfather interrupts, "Don't worry, Yugi. I'll explain everything to them. You run along and have fun, now."

His grandson smiled and nodded, "Thanks, Grandpa. See you guys later!" He walks to the door to the right beside the counter.

"Huh?" Rebecca looks at Solomon, "Hey, why's Yugi going to his room right now? Why does he have that weird helmet?"

"I'll explain later. But for now, how about we head to the living room, talk about our lives, and maybe play some of our favorite board games?"

Rebecca "hmph'd," "_You_ two play your silly board games. _I'm_ going to see what Yugi's up to."

As she tries to follow his grandson, Solomon stood in her way, "I'm sorry, Rebecca, but he can't be bothered right now."

"Why? What's so important to Yugi that he has to go to his room and not spend time with _me_?!"

* * *

><p>Yugi warped through the portal again, this time, he's getting use to it. When he reaches the light at the portal's end again, he finds himself in front of the Stage Select screen. He also found himself dressed as Lucas again.<p>

"Well, it's good to be back here again. Now, let's try out the code Mokuba gave me." He holds up his wrist and the Data Band appeared around it. Its ball glowed, projecting the holographic screen.

This morning, Mokuba had called and gave Yugi the code to enter Smash City. When he did, he gave the code to the rest of his pals.

Yugi scrolls down to the option in the middle of the screen that says, "Login to Smash City". The option is only available when someone is at the Stage Select screen. That's one thing that Mokuba forgot to point out.

He pressed SELECT on it, a password screen popped up afterwards. He sees a numeral keypad below, with the "enter" key. Yugi speaks out the numbers while typing the in, "8, 5, 6, 4." After typing in the code and hitting "enter", he heard a computerized voice that says, **"****Access approved."**

A new image appeared at the bottom of the bigger screen. It looks like a city, just like the one Mokuba described last night.

"Alright, I'm in! Now, time to check it that place out."

Yugi holds up his hands in a horizontal holding position, causing his Data Band to disappear. A Wii remote appeared in his hands. He scrolls the cursor to Smash City. After pressing the "2" button, he vanished, leaving the screen to load again.

* * *

><p>Yugi materialized from midair, he landed on his butt. "Ow! So much for not really feeling anything here," he said in pain. After standing up, he rubs his bottom before dusting off some virtual dirt. After straightening himself out, he looks around the environment and gasped.<p>

He found himself standing in the middle of a street, but no cars are present. Instead, he's surrounded by tall, colorful, futuristic buildings. A lot of the skyscrapers have walls that are made of glass, just like Domino Heights. They shine from the reflection of light emanating from the very realistic sun.

"Wow," Yugi said in utter impressiveness, "Kaiba and Pegasus has really outdone themselves."

Unbeknown to Yugi, Mokuba is standing on top of a small building on his right, watching him sightseeing. He's wearing a dark green jumpsuit under a silver flight jacket. He has a brown utility belt wrapped around hi waist with two objects attached on both his sides: on the right, a laser gun inside its holster, strapped to his thigh, and a strange, hexagonal device with a glowing, blue core. He also has on a headset, featuring a monocle-like covering with a lime-colored lens in front of his right eye. Finally, he wears silver, fingerless gloves, a pair of black and red tanker boots, and he has cream_colored fox ears in his hair and a creamy foxtail with a white tip. His headset around his head had stuffed down the upper part of his hair, making the rest of his hair look half its average size.

Mokuba cupped his hands around his mouth and called out to Yugi, "I see you're already enjoying the city, Yugi!"

Mokuba's call made Yugi turn his head in separate directions. He stopped as he spotted the other boy on the roof of the building on his right. Before he could get a good look at his clothing, Mokuba leaped off the roof. Yugi watched him land on his feet in style.

He stood, "'Sup, Yugi?"

"Hey, Mokuba," Yugi smiles. "I'm loving this secret stage, already. I like your outfit, by the way."

"Right back at 'cha."

"So, who are you supposed to be?"

"I'll tell you that later, but right now, the others are waiting."

"Ok. Where?"

"I told them to wait at the Smash Tower, the tallest building in the stage. We can't see it from here, but when we go around some of these skyscrapers, we'll be able to see easily."

"Sounds cool! Where to?"

"I'll lead the way. C'mon!" He walks past behind Yugi. The spiky-headed teen follows.

* * *

><p>The two boys walked down the street. "Ok, Yugi, when you see a really tall and really skinny building with a ginormous Smash Ball on top, that's the tower."<p>

Yugi nodded, "Got it."

When the boys walked past the last building, Yugi spotted the purple tower Mokuba described. It's taller than the others, it's slender I width, and it has the oversized, glowing orb on the top. They could see it straight ahead from a long hallway of more buildings.

"Pretty cool, isn't it?" Mokuba crosses his arms.

"It is," Yugi replied.

"That Tower is located at the center of Smash City. It's basically the heart of the city." He looks at Yugi, "Hey, you wanna race?"

Yugi looks back at the other boy and nodded, "Sure! Why not?"

"Hmm. Good luck." He makes a mad dash to the tower. He ran as fast as a fox, which is the animal he seems to be cosplaying as.

Yugi's eyes grew entirely. He sighed, "I'm guessing _that_ is 'why not'. Wonderful." He makes a dash after the other boy.

Mokuba glanced back to Yugi, who's trying his best to catch up. He grinned, "What's the matter, Yugi? Am I too fast for ya?"

A vein popped in the spike-haired boy's head. He tries to sprint after him, but he still couldn't catch up. Catching up to his apparently fleet-footed "opponent" is only causing struggle for him.

"Don't worry, Yugi! You can meet me at the tower after you're done eating my virtual dust! See ya!" Mokuba sticks his tongue out as he faces the tower, leaving poor Yugi behind.

Just as he's about to give up, he thought about what Mokuba said this morning. _Wait a minute, _he thought, _Mokuba mentioned that special moves are really effective here. So maybe... _When Yugi studied his moveset, his recovery move is the PK Thunder. He decided to try it out. He stops in his tracks. His shoes roughly rubbing against the concrete made a tire screeching sound, also causing a trail of dust from behind. He slowly makes a complete stop.

As he watches the other boy dashing to the tower, he calls out his superpower, "PK Thunder!" He shot an electric, purple ball from his palms. He uses his mind to guide the ball to his back. He learns that when a character like his attacks himself with his PK Thunder, the attack actually launches the controller across the opposite direction where the thunder hits him.

The electric ball blasted him in the back, making him launch across the road like a rocket. He's flying so fast, that he's already about to bypass Mokuba. In other stages, the thunder launch strategy could only launch him at a few feet. But in Smash City, he could be launched as far as the eye can see.

Mokuba heard Yugi screaming. Before he could glance behind him, Yugi had passed him. "What the!?" Mokuba exclaimed in surprise and outrage as he saw Yugi turn his head and stuck his own tongue back at him.

After he's done imitating his taunt, Yugi noticed that Mokuba's covered in flames. "Two can play at that game," he said before he launches himself after Yugi. Thanks to the city, he could also travel at farther distances with his recovery move, known as the Fox Fire. He flew close enough to Yugi for a neck-n-neck.

Almost to the tower, the boy in electricity and the boy in flames tries to get pass each other. Their hairs are flowing against the pressured wind like crazy. They exchange looks. Mokuba has a determined face while Yugi looks back, but in wonder.

"Hey, Mokuba? I just thought of something."

"Yeah?"

" Um, how do we stop?"

"I don't know. But know that you mention it..."

They both look back at the tower, realizing that they're coming too close to it, with no way of stopping. In panic, they both screamed. Before they could think, they crashed through the large door. A loud thud noise was heard from outside.

After some dust cleared, Yugi and Mokuba find themselves headfirst against a large, glass, elevator tube. The electricity and flames around them vanished. They fell on the floor.

When the boys picked themselves up, they rubbed their heads. Yugi groaned, "I can't believe I've went too far again."

"Hey, don't worry about," Mokuba stopped rubbing his head, "this game can do that to you. We're just trying to have fun. No biggie."

"Yeah, I guess you're right." As Yugi stopped rubbing, he looked around the room. The entire room is empty. He looked up, only to see the tall transportation tube. The room is as high as the tube. "Why is this tower so empty? Where is everybody?"

"Oh. Never mind _this _room. The real fun is up in the big Smash Ball."

"Woah. There's a room in there?"

"Yep," he smiled, "the room is almost as big as the ball itself Everybody else is up there." The young boys see an elevator coming down the glass tube. As the transporter hits the floor, the glass door slide open, and then so did the elevator door. "C'mon, you're gonna love the room."

Yugi smiled and nodded, "Sure."

After they both walked in, both doors closed back up. Then, the elevator lifted back up to the tube, disappearing up into the dark hole.

**(Review/Favorite/Follow, please!)**


	11. Chapter 11

**(Sorry for not updating in awhile, I've been busy throughout all last week, and I had little time and energy to continue writing, not to mention- Well, you'll see why else in this chapter. Leave a review when you're done. Please and thank you)**

Standing inside the elevator, Mokuba decided to have a quick conversation with Yugi, "So, Yugi, who'd you think won the race down there, me or you?"

"Why don't we just call it a tie," he responds, "and promise to never do that again?"

He chuckled, "Ok, fine by me. By the way, Yugi, I've sent more helmets to some other people we know."

"Huh. You know, Professor Arthur and Rebecca just came by at the shop. He said that there's going to be an Egyptian festival at the museum next week. There'll be Duel Monsters and other fun activities there."

"Cool. Are you gonna be there?"

"Sure! I'm gonna ask my friends if they would like to come later. Maybe you guys would like to go?"

"Well, I don't know about Seto, but _I'll _think about it." If his brother wanted to go to the last place he would ever be at, it would probably only to challenge Yugi to Duel Monsters again. The boys noticed the elevator finally opening. "Alright, we're here!"

They stepped out of the elevator. Yugi glanced back to see the elevator go back down, with the outer cylinder door closing. He looked around to find himself in the middle of a big, round room they've entered. It seems to be like a recreation room. As he looks around he sees a large, flat screen TV on top of an expensive-looking nightstand with a sleek counter. A couch is set in front of the TV with a chairs and a love seat beside them, and a coffee table in the middle, giving that area a living room touch.

He glanced down at the purple carpeted floor with yellow and orange circles.

There are arcade games everywhere. He finds his friends playing each one. Joey is playing a game called Coin Launcher, Tea and Tristan are playing against each other at arcade-style basketball, with the balls looking Smash Balls, and Bakura is playing air hockey against Duke. The air hockey players have somewhat similar clothing to Mokuba's.

Duke is wearing a red jumpsuit under a white flight jacket and a pair of black tanker boots. He has on the same belt strapped with a holster. The holster contains a laser gun. The headset he's wearing doesn't have a computerized monocle like Mokuba's. He also has the blue, feathered tail of a bird.

Bakura's outfit is kind of different, and **really** unexpected. The white-haired boy wears a tunic-like armor with spiked shoulder pads, black bicep bands, black gloves with purple lining sharp claws, a pair of black pants, spiked knee pads, black boots with purple lining (like the gloves), and a small chain attached from the holster strapped to his right thigh to the belt with a gold emblem. He also wears a blue monocle-like device around his left eye, and he has a gray wolf tail with two white tips.

"Huh, wasn't expecting Bakura to be character with _that _type of clothing," Yugi said bewilderedly. Bakura has always bee a kind, innocent person, aside from always being possessed by the Spirit of the Millenium Ring. Yugi find it ironical that he chose a character that looks like a villainous wolverine. It seemed more like Duke's taste, being a lady's man with a hint of a "bad boy" personality.

"Yeah, uh, it was supposed to be the other way around, they said there was a glitch at the character screen." As much as KaibaCorp doesn't want to admit it, they knew that no development of theirs will ever come out perfect, at least, maybe not all of them. Mokuba claps his hands loud enough for everyone in the room to hear, "Okay, guys. Let's get started!"

"Good, because I am really sick of playing this game," said Tea, missing every shot for the hoop on her side, while Tristan keep making perfect shots almost effortlessly.

"Aw, c'mon! Just give me a minute to finish these guys." Joey is playing on some sort of game table. On the outer edge of the table, he uses a joystick around his right hand to move the little battle spaceship in a pivoting motion. He uses his left hand to mash on the big, red button to shoot coins as ammo at some different types of enemies. Holographic screens on both sides are projected at the perfect angle for Joey to see clearly. The left screen shows how many coins are left, and there is a power meter below it. On the other side, a screen shows the number of certain items he won, which are stickers and trophies.

"Come on, Joey," the blonde heard Duke calling, "we're about to start."

"In a minute!" Right now, Joey has 50 coins left. Once there are none, the game is over.

Joey then hears Tristan's voice, "C'mon, man! You've been playing that game nonstop for the past 30 minutes! Bring your skirt-wearing butt over here!"

That last comment made Joey grit his teeth and growl. Finally, he turned his head over his shoulder and yelled, **Hey! Would'ja give it a rest, already?! It's called a tunic, ya chump! Get it right!" **While the hotheaded boy was screaming his head off... again, three orange rocket missiles came out of nowhere and headed straight for the spaceship. They each sounded out a brief warning single, but Joey's screaming caused him to not hear. As hear turned his sight back to the table, the three missiles successfully shot the ship before he had a chance to react, causing his coin count to drop to 0. "Oh, come on!"

Yugi plops onto the black, tree-man couch, on the far left side, "So, what's this thing you guys are starting?"

Bakura sits on the same couch, on the right side, "We're about to try out the game's Adventure Mode."

"Really? But Joey said that we're going to do Classic Mode first."

"Well, yeah," Tristan said, landing his butt on a red tub chair while Duke sits on a brown, leather, electric recliner chair, "Mokuba insists that we should give the Adventure Mode a go first. Don't worry, we'll do Classic Mode someday."

"Yeah. Sorry, Yuge, change of plans," said Joey, who starts to sit on the blue loveseat next to Tea.

"Hmm." Yugi wonders why Mokuba wanted everyone to take on the Adventure Mode so badly. Looks like he's about to find out.

"Ok, guys," announced Mokuba as he flips onto the middle of the couch between Yugi and Bakura with a Wii Remote in his hand, "let's not waste anymore time. Let's do this!" He presses the POWER button on the remote's upper left corner with his thumb. The TV upfront turned on, showing everyone the game's title screen.

Mokuba holds his remote sideways and pressed the button on the far right side. The screen goes from the title screen to the another.

While waiting, Tea speaks to Joey, "So, Joey, how many trophies and stickers you won from Coin Launcher?"

"Eh, not dat much," the blonde has his elbow leaning on the right arm of the couch, "I only won like 11 trophies and 18 stickers."

"Hmm. Well that doesn't sound bad at all."

"It does when you start off with ova 1400 coins."

"I'm confused. How does that game work?"

"Eh, I'll show you guys some other time."

"Great. By the way, didn't Serenity get to play with the helmet yet?"

"Not yet. I _was _going to let her try it out right now, but I'd ratha' have her wait 'til hers get delivered 'cause I don't trust those two loser **flirts** ova' dere around her while I'm not around." He glares at the two teenagers across from him.

"Aw, c'mon, Joe," Tristan argues, "May I remind you who was the guy that made sure Serenity was safe while she was wearing bandages around her eyes?"

"Not to mention the charming hero who helped?" Duke added.

"I'd _still _ratha' wait 'til _she_ gets her helmet," the protective teen glared more darkly.

"OK, guys! We're about to get started!" Mokuba's announcement made everyone look at the television. Mokuba has the cursor around an option that says, "Adventure Mode: The Subspace Emissary."

"'The Subspace Emissary'?" Yugi asked.

"Yeah. It's like the coolest story mode in any game. You get to save the world Subspace and its minions." Mokuba presses the 2 button to select it. After that screen, the gang sees another one with two options: "New" and "Continue". "Alright, now check _this_ out." As he pressed "New", two rows of two big circles on the floor by the sides of the TV opened like doors. Nobody seemed to notice those circles at first. The gang watch four tall, tube-shaped pods rise from them slowly.

"Woah! What are those?" asked Joey as the pods rose all the way up to stop.

Mokuba gets up from his seat, "Ok, everybody, there are some rules I have to explain to you all before we get started, so please pay attention real good... In this mode, we will be fighting countless amounts of enemies, as I said before. All stages in this mode are never-before-seen and they are only in this mode alone. Each stage requires four players to fight and travel in a stage. You can either have 1 or 2 fighters in a stage at a time while others wait. Yes, you can actually travel through almost every one of these special stages; most of them, you can walk through, and the box, or barrier around you will move along with you. But on others, if the box around you is moving automatically, you have to move along with it and stay within the box, or else you'll disappear from the stage and you lose your turn." He walks over to the pods to the left and stood between them, "Speaking of 'turns', that's where these transportation pods come in. Each person get into one of these pods if they want to participate. You can also go through magical doors that lead you to another area. The stage is not over until you either pass through a gold door or defeat a boss character. Also, each enemy, including the bosses, will have life meters, so when they run out, they're automatically sent off the stage. Any questions?"

Tea raises her hand, "Um, can you give us more examples about working together or playing solo?"

"And about dose pod thingies," said Joey.

"Sure," he nodded, "With one person in a stage at a time, if they get knocked out of the stage, he or she will be sent back in this room automatically while the next fighter is sent. With two fighters at a time, let's say, Joey's number 1, Tristan's 2, Yugi's 3, and Tea's 4. If numbers 1 and 2 goes first in a stage, it doesn't matter who loses a turn first. If number 1 (Joey) gets K.O.'d, number 3 (Yugi) will be sent next to help number 2 (Tristan). If any of them fighters are K.O.'d, then number 4 (Tea) will be sent. If the two remaining characters gets knocked out, the stage is over and you'll have to start over, same goes for single player. If two people are traveling at once, the box will move along with the fighter with the leading number while the other will get teleported closer to the leader if they get too far."

"Heh, heh, hear dat Tristan? I'm number 1 and YOU'RE number 2," Joey grinned.

With arms crossed, Tristan fakes a laugh, "Yeah, we'll see when you're the one who gets knocked out first, buddy."

"And as for the pods, they'll teleport you inside the TV. You will not be able to return until either your turn or the stage run is over. You can't log off the game or activate your Data Band at all, either. If you're waiting, your mind will be in a waiting stock. The rest of us will be able to watch your performances on TV. Each pod has a number on their floor from 1 to 4, to determine who goes first to last... Okay, I think that's enough info for now, soooooo do I have any volunteers who would like to go first?"

"Well, you can count me and Yugi in," said Joey, with his thumb up, "Right, Yuge?"

The spike-haired teen nodded, "Sure." He and Joey gets up from their seats.

"Cool. Anymore volunteers?"

Tristan gets up from the chair, "Well, I certainly wouldn't these two getting fun. I'll go, too. How about you, Tea?"

"No thanks," she said, "I'll just watch for now."

"In that case," Duke props himself from the recliner chair, "I'll take the honors and help fight some enemies."

"Awesome," Mokuba said gratefully as the doors of the pods opened. "Now, if you guys would kindly step into these pods, and then we can get started."

**(Wow, that was a lot of rules to come up with. If you guys want to know who the others are representing as; Mokuba is dressed as Fox, Duke is Falco, and Bakura is Wolf. Those three characters are all from the Star Fox franchise. They'll be going over in later chapters. Coin Launcher is an actual mini game in SSBB, I'll also be going over that in later chapters if you want more information. As for the rules for Adventure Mode, if you're confused about some details, please let me know. Now, if you guys don't mind I'm gonna go eat some spaghetti.)**


	12. Chapter 12

**(Ok, so I'm gonna do something a little special, starting with this chapter. I'm gonna use two symbols to explain what enemies and items there are and what they do at the bottom of these chapters. () = enemies, and [] = items. If you're still confused, don't worry. You'll know what I mean as you read through the chapter.) **

Before Yugi stepped into his teleportation pod, he looked down at the number on its floor; a number 1. "Guess that means I'm going first?"

"Yeah, Yuge," said Joey, stepping into his pod, "I got number 2. "I thought _I'm _number 2," said Tristan form the other side while he and Duke step into their pods. "What? You wanna go back already?" Duke laughed.

"Would you just shut up? Besides, Yugi deserves to be number 1 anyway, bein' da King of Games and all. Right, pal?"

"Right," said Yugi as they all got into their pods.

Mokuba sits back on the couch, with the Wii remote still in his hand. "Ok, guys. All set?"

The boys all turned around to see their audience:

"Ready," said Yugi.

"Ready ta kick some butt, dat is," added Joey, having a thumb up and adding a wink.

"Let's get this party started," answered Tristan, with arms crossed.

"I was born ready... and handsome," said Duke, flipping the bangs of his hair with style.

"Great," said Mokuba. "And remember, depending on how good or lucky the first fighter(s) is, you'll never know if you'll get a chance while you're waiting in the waiting stock. One more thing, do you guys want to do 1 player or 2 players at a time?"

"Let's do 2 players," responded Joey. " I wanna see how good me and Yugi work together to take on some enemies! How's dat sound, Yuge?"

"Sounds great, Joey," the shorter teen nodded.

"Good luck, fellows," cheered Bakura.

"Oh, please," Tea giggled, "since when do they ever need luck when they've got each other to depend on?"

"Exactly, Tea," Mokuba agreed. "Ok. I'm going to close your pods. Here we go!" Pressing the 2 button on the remote caused the four pods to close, locking the volunteers inside. As Mokuba sees the 1 player and 2 player modes on the TV, he selects 2 player.

Yugi looks around the enclosed environment around him, excited, but a little worried. He just thought about that phone conversation he had with Mokuba the other night. He wonders why he was stammering about the characters and the game. Is he hiding something? Yugi doesn't really want to think about it, but he couldn't help feeling curious. He and his pals have through worse, so if something _is_ up, he's sure that it couldn't possibly be as bad as the other situations in the past, or at least he hopes.

Hoping that he doesn't regret agreeing to this, he closes his eyes and hopes that the stage runs will go smoothly.

As the pods starts to make whirring sounds, Yugi, Joey, Tristan, and Duke's bodies begin to morph into little specks of light. The specks swirl around inside the pods. They each gather around to form a ball before disappearing into a flash of light.

After they heard the pods stop whirring, Mokuba, Tea, and Bakura looked at the screen. They see a movielike cutscene showing a stadium floating in midair. Mokuba points the white remote at the coffee. As he presses the A button on the upper middle, Bakura and Tea watched it make an intercom appear on the rectangular table. "Tea, come over here," instructed the bushy-hair kid."

She got off the two-person couch and walked over to the bigger couch.

"What's that for?" she asked as she took a closer look at the small, silver intercom.

"You'll see."

* * *

><p>Yugi still has his eyes closed. He started to hear noises, like a crowd cheering. He opens his eyes, slowly. As he blinks a couple of times, he widened them completely to see himself in the middle of some kind of a baseball stadium. Two layers, perhaps stories, of stadium bleachers containing thousands of cheering fans each, chanting, <strong>"Time to brawl! Time to brawl! Time to brawl! Time to brawl!"<strong>

Yugi finds himself standing in the middle of a floating blue platform with silver coverings around the edges down in the stadium's center with Joey behind him, back-to-back. The short in childish clothing and the blonde teen in green continues to look around the massive environment, hearing nothing but the crowd's loud cheering. Joey said, "Man, check dis place out! We're practically surrounded by virtual fans!" He closed his eyes and makes a goofy smile, "And maybe when we're done kickin' butt, they might want our virtual autographs. Nyee hee hee hee!"

"Yeah! Reminds me when the pharaoh took on Kaiba in a duel during the Battle City semi-finals."

**"Yugi, Joey, can you hear me?"**

The boys heard a familiar voice in their. It made them whip their heads around in multiple directions. "Eh, Yugi? Please tell me you heard dat, too," said Joey, hoping that he's not going crazy.

"Yeah, I hear it too, Joey," Yugi places his right hand to his ear, "Mokuba? Is that you?"

**"Yeah! We have an intercom so we could all communicate."**

Tea's voice kicked in,** "Can you guys hear us clearly?" **

"Loud-n-clear, Tea," Joey responds, "But, uh, why do we need ta communicate? Why?"

"What do you 'why'?!" Mokuba yelled into the intercom, holding down a "Call" button on the top, "You need information on the journey you'll be taking on, you're also gonna need some advice on how to beat tough enemies."

"Mokuba's right, you guys," Bakura, "You need _us_ to guide you through this journey, and we'd expect you to do the same for us."

"Of course! This program requires teamwork and determination, you know," said Tea.

"That's right! And don't forget: If all 4 fighters go down, the mission's cancelled, and we'll have to start over again," warned Mokuba. "However, if you're next in line at the stock, you'll be sent to the same part of an area where the last fighter got knocked out, kinda like a checkpoint, but not for the same person."

"Ok," Joey understood, along with Yug, who looks up back at the taller boy, "We get da point. Sorry for questioning you."

**"It's cool, Joey. So, how'd you like the scenery at your point-of-view? 'Cause we are lovin' the HD in the TV at our- Wha-? Hey, heads up!"**

Yugi and Joey looked up to see two objects falling from the sky, through the clouds. Yugi squints his eyes to try to get a better look, "What are they?"

Before they had time to guess, the two objects landed on the silver ends of the same platform, one in front of Yugi, the other in front of Joey. The object in front of Joey seems to be a statue of a pink, round creature with a face, two small balls for arms, and two red, legless feet. The one in front of Yugi is also a statue, a statue of a short plumber with a bushy mustache. He wears red clothing under blue overalls, white gloves, brown shoes, and a red cap with the letter "M" in the middle. Both statues stand on golden, disk-like stands with the Super Smash Brothers symbol.

Both the statues started to glow, making everyone gasp. Cyclonic rings circled up around the statues, when the rings disappeared, the statues started moving, they have been brought to life. Joey exclaims while he glanced behind him, "Woah! It's Mario and Kirby!"

_Maria and Kirby, _thought Yugi as he looked to his right at the sky to his and Joey's damage percentages, along with Mario and Kirby's. Mokuba and the others could see their percentages on the bottom of the screen.

Mario the plumber makes a fighting stance while Kirby the cute little puffball just stood their innocently. Yugi speaks, "Uh, what's going on?"

**"If you want to move forward, you and Joey will have to beat computerized fighters that is Mario and Kirby in a 2-on-2 fight,"** explained Mokuba, over the intercom.

Joey whips out his sword from his back, "Well, usually, I'd take on the famous Mario, but I'll let you have the honors, Yuge."

"Ok," he nodded. "By the way, what do they do? How do they fight?"

Joey would explain but..., "Sorry, bud. I don't think we have time for an enemy bio. Looks we're about ta start. Get ready!"

Mario leaps into the air and shoots a fireball from his right hand. "Look out!" Yugi yelled, making him and Joey dash to opposite directions, missing the fireball.

"And the battle begins," said Mokuba as he watch the fight on the TV with the others.

Tea cheered, "Go, Yugi!"

Bakura cheered, "Stay on guard, Joey!"

With a loud battle yell and his sword ready, Joey sprints towards the little round creature. Before the young swordsman could get close to him, Kirby opened his big mouth and sucked Joey into it like a vacuum.

Tea gasped in horror while Bakura says, "Wh-what happened?!"

"It's Kirby's main special ability," Mokuba explains, "When he swallows up one of his enemies, he absorbs _their _standard attacks before he spits them out."

As Kirby spits out a star, the star morphed into a Joey with a headache. The blonde teen looks up and sees Kirby wearing the same green stocking cap as he is, indicating whose he is copying.

As Mario blasts another fireball from his palm, Yugi counters it with PK Fire by yelling out the name and shooting a fiery bolt from his fingertips. Just then, a black bomb with white eyes and violet little feet magically**[1]** appeared behind Yugi.

**"Hey, Yugi," **said Mokuba's voice, **"there's an item behind you!"**

Yugi turned around and sees the round explosive right beside his feet. He quickly bends down to pick him before facing back to Mario, "Alright, I have a bomb with me and I'm not afraid to-" Before he finished, the wick of the bomb lit by itself.

"Yugi!" He heard Joey's call and turned around, "That's a Bob-omb! It blows up by itself! Get rid of that thing!" Yugi looks down at the bomb, which is turning red and the wick is almost completely incinerating. In a panic, Yugi quickly turns back and throws the bob-omb at Mario. With quick thinking, the CPU character reaches his pocket and whips out a yellow cloth. Mario slaps the Bob-omb with the cloth, causing the combustible item to repel back to Yugi. Before the spiky-haired teen could react, the bomb exploded as it touched, causing him to fly over the other side of the stage. He flew at the point where he reached the edge right behind Kirby. He grabs onto the edge just in time.

Everyone (especially Tea) watched in horror as Yugi hung onto the edge of the stage, his damage percentage rose up to a whopping 53%.

"Oh, no. Yugi!" Joey called out for him, while Kirby has a bow in his right hand and an in the other. The Bow attack was Joey's character's standard attack. The pink creature shoots an arrow at Joey, but Joey got up and blocks it with his shield, he then inserts his Master Sword back into the sheath before whipping out his Gale Boomerang and throws it at the adorable creature with a cyclone appearing around it. The range was so strong, it hits Kirby and he flew backwards and fell off the stage.

Yugi watches as Kirby falls down from under him. "Ha-ha! Way to go, Joey!"

Just then, Kirby sucked in a large amount of "air" and flaps his little "arms", allowing him to float back up like a balloon with success. "What? Oh, no you don't!" Yugi bounces off ledge with a flip. As his feet are directly towards Kirby, he stomps on his head with both of his feet alternatively, making a four-sided star appear under his feet. With one last powerful stomp, Yugi leaped off of Kirby landed back up onto the stage while Kirby lost his recovery and plummeted down through the barrier, bursting into lights.

"Yeah!" Tea and Mokuba yelled in amazement while Mokuba raises his fist up and Bakura chuckled in awe.

"That was cool, Yugi!" Joey tries to run over to the short boy, but a powerful jet of water splashed in his back and caused him to fall face-first onto the floor. Yugi exclaimed as he run over to the fallen warrior.

"Joey, are you okay?" He looked straight to Mario, he has a strange, cannon-like device with a chrome spray nozzle strapped to his back know as the Flash Liquidizer Ultra Dousing Device, or F.L.U.D.D. for short. It has a small, round water tank at the bottom. There's also some drop-bars with handle grips for Mario to maintain the device.

Joey groaned as he got up and answered, "Yeah, I'm fine." He stands up and turns to face the plumber. They see another item appear in the middle of the stage, this time, a silver, 2', bazooka-shaped gun**[2]**. It stands upright on its shoulder mount end. It also has a grip on the other end and a cylindrical, optical instrument for accurate aiming with a triggering button under it. A courageous smile spread across the blonde's face, "Ready ta take dis guy down, Yugi?"

Yugi nodded, also smiling, "You bet I am."

"Alright, when you grab dat Super Scope, hold onto da trigger to release a power full ball of light," he instructed.

'Got it."

Joey dashes towards Mario. The short man charges up his F.L.U.D.D. before squirting another stream of H2O liquid at Joey, but the young swordsman jumped to avoid it while Yugi ducked. Mario leaped up at the same length as Joey. The blond teen slashes the plumber with his Master Sword, raising his percentage to 15. While still in midair, the short plumber rocketed back to Joey, and performs a downwards, swinging blow on Joey's head with his fist, knocking him down to the floor, face-first once again,

Tea, Mokuba, and Bakura gasped in horror as the blow also increased Joey's damage to 27%.

Mario landed a few feet away from Joey, who quickly gets up on his hands and knees. As soon as Mario is about to shoot another fireball from his hands, Joey grinned, "Yugi, NOW!"

Yugi leaped up from behind Joey, with the Super Scope in hand. He places the shoulder mount on his left shoulder, holds the grip with his left hand, looks through the eyepiece with his eye, and holds the trigger button with the fingers of his other hand. As the Scope charges, solar energy forms inside the gun-hole. After a couple of seconds, Yugi releases a giant sphere of light and smashes into Mario. The blast knocked the short, mustached man out of the stage and disappeared through the barrier, blasting into colorful lights.

Tea and the boys gave off earsplitting cheers, along with the thousands of people in the stadium.

Yugi landing back on his feet while Joey stood back up on his. The Super Scope in Yugi's hand disappeared. Joey wonders why that happened, because the Scope doesn't vanish until all of the light ammo runs out, and it doesn't run out until two more powerful shots were fired. But, that doesn't matter now, Yugi and Joey had defeated two superstars with teamwork, and that's what truly matters to them.

Yugi and Joey looks at each other. **"Yeah!" **They yelled in unison as they gave each other a high-five before waving their hands around to the virtual crowd, who cheers even louder.

**"That was awesome, you guys," **said the voice of Tea.

**"Yeah, you've showed them who's boss,"** said Mokuba.

"Well, thanks, guys," said Joey as he then looks up to a direction as if he had noticed something.

"Yeah," Yugi nodded, "We really appreciate the support. Of course, we wouldn't have gotten this far if it wasn't for our teamwork. So, I wonder what's next."

"Uh, Yuge?" The spiky-headed boy looks back at Joey, who is still looking at a different direction, "I think we're about ta find out." Yugi was confused until a strange sound and an earth tremor made the crowd stop applauding abruptly. The noise and earth tremor also made the living room audience stop their cheering.

Yugi faced the same direction as Joey. Crimson clouds hovered over the stadium, about to eclipse the entire sky. Under the clouds, something else is flying slowly over the stadium, a giant battleship. The battleship has mounted weaponry and four sleek, bat-like gliders on its sides. It has a mask on its bow. It also a bizarre-looking cannons mounted on top.

"Dat thing is huge," said the breath-taken Joey.

**"What's happening, you guys?" **asked Bakura's voice.

Yugi responded, "No idea. Hey, Joey, you know what's going on?"

"Eh, not really, Yugi."

Yugi turned to face Joey in shock, "What do you mean 'not really'?"

The taller teen looks down at the shorter teen, "Hey, I didn't say I actually played the Adventure Mode before."

"You had a copy of the game for over a week! And you said you'd introduce me to this mode yesterday." Yugi continues while the entire stadium is shrouded in a dark, bloody color by the clouds. "Are you seriously telling me that you've never played 'The Subspace Emissary', at all?"

"Um, no." He laughs nervously while waving his hands, "M'must've slipped ma'mind."

The boys soon looked up to see the foreign battleship slowly fly over their heads. A door underneath the humongous vehicle opened, releasing at least hundred of purple orbs of fuzz onto the platform.

Trembling on her side of the couch, Tea asked "What's that thing doing?"

"It looks like that ship is releasing some sort of orbs," Bakura answered, "but, I have no idea what they are."

"I think I do," said Mokuba, before receiving looks from the two teenagers sitting between him. He reaches the intercom and presses down on the button again, "Stay on guard, guys. I have a feeling that something bad's going to happen."

**"You tellin' me. It's snowin' carpet balls ova' here," **said Joey, from their end.

Yugi and Joey walked back to the middle, back-to-back again, surrounded by the balls falling down like snow.

"Man, what da heck is up with these things?"

"Joey, look!" Joey turned around, some of the fuzzes gathers around into small piles. A creature emerged from one of those piles, its purple body turned into a different color. It is a humanlike creature with a (literally) dark face but with nothing but two red eyes**(1)**, it wears a greenish soldier cap and a matching, limbless jumpsuit with a silver collar with a horizontal line in the middle, it also wear brown gloves, and brown boots. Its suit has a symbol on the chest, a red circle the a line passing through half the diameter.

The boys watch as a few more of these evil beings emerge out of the other piles like zombies. "Those fuzzes..." Yugi spoke, "They're forming some sort of... evil soldiers."

Joey noticed there is a health bar floating above each soldier's head. He pulls out his sword, "So these must be da first evil enemies in the Adventure Mode," he smiled, "and da first evildoers ta get there butts by the one and Joey Wheeler and his sidekick, Yugi!"

Tea groaned while the boys face-palmed themselves.

Yugi faces his eyes towards Joey unimpressively, while preparing to fight, "Sidekick? Really?"

A sweat-drop glides own the back of his head, "Hehe, my bad. Got a little carried away."

**"Yeah, no kidding," **said Tea's voice.

**"Hey, guys," **said Mokuba's, "**I think these things are called Primids.** **Keep your heads up."**

"Will do, Mokuba," said Yugi, watching the Primids slowly coming closer. Without wasting any time, a Primid jumps up and launches a drop kick at Yugi. Joey turns around and throws the Gale Boomerang at the soldier, canceling its attack and knocking it to the floor. Its health bar decreased halfway down. Before it could stand up, Yugi launches another Pk Fire at it, blasting it out of the stage.

"Dat's one down," declared Joey as his boomerang returned back to his hand. He dashes at a couple of Primids that was in front of him. He slashes one of them with his sword, knocking it out instantly, and does the same to the second one.

"PK Freeze!" Yugi uses his mind to summon another magical snowflake again. He guides the snowflake to four Primids in front of him. The flake froze them at contact, knocking them off the stage.

More primids appeared from the air, two of them has a big, yellow boomerang in their hands**(2)**, four of them have, blue, glowing swords**(3)**. "Aw, great," Joey complained, "Now we have to fight dudes with weapons."

Three cloudlike creatures**(4)** appeared over Yugi's head, each has facial features, a battery on their backs, and eight tesla coils around their bodies. "They're everywhere," said Yugi, looking at the cloud monsters. The batteries generated electricity, connecting them to each coil. Next the three floating monsters swished around and shot multiply amounts of thunder balls at Yugi.

"Yugi, lookout!" Mokuba called into the intercom.

Instead of dodging out of the way, Yugi raises his hand, with his palm facing the balls of thunder. The three living room watchers are confused. Just then, a big, blue ball of energy emerged in front of Yugi's palm. When the thunder attacks hit the sphere, they disappeared inside the sphere.

Tea, and the boys watch Yugi's damage go down to 0%.

That fourth move of Yugi, known as the PSI Magnet, absorbs projectiles to reduce the user's damage. Depending on how much damage Yugi would've take, he reduces the damage equal to how much he would've taken.

Joey dashes at a another squad, he slashes away a majority of them with his Master Sword. But then, one of the sword-wielding slashed Joey away with his sword, making him fly a few feet away, he landed on his back. As he sat up, he noticed that a few more Primids materialized, but then he also noticed a crate with a fire hazard label on it**[3]** materialized around them.

Figuring that he should fight thunder with thunder, Yugi calls out his PK Thunder move and guides the violet thunder orb up to the cloud creatures with his mind. The electric orb passes through the floating monsters, reduces most of their life bars. Yugi's mind couldn't control a single thunder for a long time, so he makes it disappear. When the PK Thunder vanished, Yugi leaps up in the air, does a helicopter spin with his arms, and slapped all three creature out of sight. As he landed back down, he heard Joey's call, "Yugi!" He turns to the blonde teen. Joey points to a fire hazard crate, "Shoot dat box with your PK Fire, it'll explode!" Joey dashes out of the way, leaving the box with four Primids beside.

Yugi nodded, "Got it! PK Fire!" He shoots another bolt of fire from his fingertips. When the bolt made contact with the fire box, it combusted instantly, blasting away the four soldiers out of sight.

Next, another group of Primids appeared behind Yugi. One of them with a boomerang throws the boomerang at him. "Yugi, lookout!" Joey threw his Gale Boomerang at the other. The two boomerangs collided, canceling each other out. The blonde then spots another item behind the enemies, a big, floating, rotating, shiny star**[4]**. After retrieving his boomerang, Yugi watches Joey take out his sword, jump up, and use his Spin Attack to spin across the Primids' heads. The blonde reaches the star, and he grabs it, when he did, he's sent fling off in the sky, and then crashes onto the remaining Primids, knocking them out of the stage.

* * *

><p>Joey landed safely on his feet, he then looks around, seeing that the coast is clear. He turns to face Yugi, "Well, Yuge, it looks like dat's all of them."<p>

"Huh," Yugi said, "Hey, Mokuba, is this stage clear yet?"

Mokuba rubs his chin, "No. If a stage is clear, you'd either automatically return to the tower or go through a shiny door."

**"Well then, what's next?" **asked Joey.

Tea gasps, "Guys, look out!"

Yugi and Joey looks up to see a figure wearing green clothing riding on a flying saucer. The clothing covers everything but its two, big, yellow eyes. A big, metallic ball with a red "X" on the front and two rectangular holes on each side is attached to the bottom of the saucer. The figure detached the ball, letting hit ground with loud bang.

To everyone's surprise, two robots moved from behind the ball. Each has red, robotic arms with magnets for hands, they each also have a treadmill-like saucers instead of legs and a think cord connected to their backs and the back of the saucers. Each robot placed their arms into the holes in the ball's sides, locking into them. As they both started to pull, the ball opened, revealing a dark ball below a detonation timer set for 3 minutes.

"Wh-wha-?!" Yugi was short of words and looked up at the disguised figure, who nodded at the sacrificing robots before flying away. Yugi turns back at the device and grunts, "It's a bomb... We have to disable it, Joey! Come o-" He heard a loud clank behind him.

"Ahh! Yugi!" The short ten turned around, when he did, he finds himself inside a metal birdcage. As he tries to get out, he looked outside his cage and sees Joey trapped in another cage, hanging by some kind of giant leaf.

Tea, Mokuba, and Bakura watched the TV in horror as they see a giant, plantlike creature holding its prisoners in its leafy hands. It has an eyeless, red face covered in white polka dots with big, green lips. It has flower petals around the back of head, making him look like a flower. It has a green body with a chubby belly, stubby legs, and it is wearing red underwear or bikini with white polka dots **(or at least it looks like it's clothing)**.

Bakura yells, "What is that thing?!"

"It's Petey Piranha from the Mario Brothers series!" Mokuba starts explaining, "In this mode, two princesses were supposed to be the prisoners, not Yugi and Joey! That wasn't supposed to happen!"

"Well, I suppose if the Adventure Mode in the virtual helmet version is altered, then maybe that's the case."

"Now, what," asked Tea, watching Yugi and Joey scream for help.

Suddenly, they noticed a flash of light appeared. The flash revealed to be Tristan and Duke, standing in front of the green creature. Tristan grinned, "Don't worry, we'll take it from here. We'll get them out."

"And how exactly do we do that, genius?" added Duke. "In the original Mode, only one of them can be free."

Tristan looks at Duke, "How do you know that?"

"I have a copy of the game at home, but this is the only level I've beaten so far."

"Well, gee. Aren't you full of knowledge."

**"Duke's right," **said Mokuba, **"There's two health bar, one for Yugi, and the other for Joey, and you can only free one of them in the original version. "**

"Well, Joey, it's been nice knowing ya, but we've got a Duel Monters champ to save. I'll keep Serenity company 'til your mom returns."

"So will I," added Duke.

Joey screams his head off, with his enlarged head sticking out of the bars, "TRISTAN, YOU JERK! JUST WAIT UNTIL I GET MY HANDS ON-"

**"However," **Mokuba continues, **"In _this_ version, you may be able to free both victims, if you can wipe out both the cages' health bars at the same time." **

"We could save them both?" said Tristan. "Well, ya know, we might not be able to bust both cages at once..."

"Tristan, Duke," Yugi said, about to beg, "please try to get Joey out as well. What would Serenity say, or maybe even their mother?"

Tristan and Duke exchange looks for a moment before sighing deeply and said, "Fine."

"But I'm still going to your house regardless, Wheeler," declared Tristan as he and Duke then face the green beast before them.

Petey lets out a vicious roar at his two human opponents, showing his saliva-covered teeth and gums. He swings Joey's cage at them. Joey screamed. The two warrior leaped up, avoiding the attack in time. While in midair, Tristan pulls out a grenade, biting the pin off while Duke pulls out his laser gun and starts shooting at Yugi's cage. Tristan drops his grenade into Joey's cage.

As Petey brings the cage back in regular position. Joey felt dizzy, not noticing the grenade on the floor of his cage. He quickly recovers, "Man, I don't know what could get any worse." The grenade exploded in his cage, quickly filling with smoke. As the smoke cleared, an irritated Joey came into view, almost completely covered in soot. "I just had ta open my big mouth."

Duke continues to shoot at Yugi's cage while Tristan throws some quick punches and kicks, both the cages' health bars seem to be reducing quite quickly. Duke stops shooting and starts giving Yugi's cage a fast series of kicks, decreasing its bar even quicker. "C'mon guys, you can do it," said Yugi with encouraging words.

As soon as both the cage bars begin to become nearly finished, Petey Piranha, leaps up in the air. Tristan and Duke watches him land at the opposite side of the stage, almost close to the bomb, which is ticking down to 50 seconds.

"Man, we have got to hurry up," huffed Tristan.

Duke added, "Oh, you think?"

The boys see a wooden bat**[5] **and a glowing sword**[6]** that looks like what some of the Primids were using appear before them. Duke grabs the sword while Tristan grabs the bat and says, "Alright, at the count of three, we both take out a cage at the same time."

"Got it."

With a battle cry, they both dash at the plant monster, who lets out a most threatening roar that distorts the air.

"1..."

Petey swings both cages at the boys, who quickly jumps out of the way.

"2..."

Petey swings at them some more, but fails miserably as the came at his sides, near the cages. 30 seconds remain on the bomb's timer The two robots between it tilts their heads down and closes their eyes.

"3!"

Tristan and Duke swings their weapons at the cages. As they made contact, both of the health bars vanished at the same time. As the cages busted open, Yugi and Joey disappeared and Petey Piranha fell down and blew up, forcing the boys to shield their eyes.

As the smoke slowly cleared, the boys opens their eyes and looks around, the green plant moster is gone. They look up at the sky to see a notification that says "Stage Cleared!"

Tristan blinks, "'Stage Cleared'?"

"Yeah, _this _stage is about to be cleared, alright," Tristan glances back at Duke, who is pointing at the bomb, 8 seconds remaining.

"Aw, man! C'mon, we've gotta disarm it!"

Before the two could even run to the bomb, they both virtually disappeared. The timer on the bomb reached to 0, when it did, instead of exploding like normal bombs, the dark ball inside instantly grew bigger and bigger, outsizing the entire stadium, swallowing it, trapping it inside. When it's completely covered in the void, the purplish, black sphere stopped growing, making as if the stadium never existed.

* * *

><p><strong>Enemies:<strong>

**(1) - Primids: The basic enemies of the game, also the most common. They punch, kick, and jump.**

**(2) - Boom Primids: Primids who uses boomerangs as their weapon of choice.**

**(3) - Sword Primids: Primids who uses Beam Swords as their weapon of choice.**

**(4) - Spaaks: Common, cloudlike monsters that attacks by shooting slow, electric spheres with low knockback, sometimes lightning bolts. **

**Items:**

**[1] - Bob-omb: An item that will explode on contact when hit or thrown. After a short time, they will start walking back and forth on the stage and then will stop, turn red and explode.**

**[2] - Super Scope: A peripheral device that shoots orbs of light at a long range. It can be fired rapidly or charged up to release a powerful blast. It only has enough energy for 3 charge shots.**

**[3] - Blast Box: A crate with a fire hazard on it that will explode if it makes contact with fire.**

**[4] - Warp Star: A powerful item that sends a player flying off into the sky and crashing down into the stage when picked up.**

**[5] - Home-run Bat: A powerful tool that is instant K.O. when smashed. It can also cause serious damage when thrown.**

**[6] - Beam Sword: A long-range, clobbering that can be wielded and charged for melee attacks or can be thrown. Its length changes depending on the fighter wielding it, and the intensity of the attack performed with its smash attack generally having a very long range.**


	13. Chapter 13

The four pods opened up, revealing the four boys who just took on the first Adventure Mode stage.

As they boys opened their eyes, they realized that they're back in the rec room in the top of Smash Tower. They see Tea, Mokuba, and Bakura sitting on the three-man couch, with a silver intercom on the coffee table, the one Mokuba said that they were using to communicate with fighters in the TV.

"So," Mokuba started to ask, "How did you like the first stage?"

Joey smiled and raised his fist, "Oh, it was awesome!" His face then morphed into a disappointed mope, "except for da fact dat me and Yugi just got trapped like a couple'a rats." Joey didn't expect that he and Yugi would round up locked cages by a giant flower with legs, and neither did Mokuba. He also didn't expect that Tristan and Duke would be sent onstage when he and Yugi weren't even K.O.'d offstage. Now he knows what it's like to be a damsel in distress, or Mokuba, considering that he's dressed up as a warrior who rescues a damsel, which is very ironic.

"Yeah, uh, sorry about that, guys, I didn't expect that _you_ would be locked in cages. The prisoners were supposed to be Princess Peach and Princess Zelda."

Joey crosses his arms, "Well, knowin' Pegasus an' your brotha', I'm pretty sure they'd tweak a few things in Brawl's Adventure Mode just ta irritate us."

Rubbing his head, Duke the next to speak, "Hey, uh, can someone explain what happened with the stadium?" He walks out of his teleportation pod.

Tristan gasps, "That's right! We were trying to deactivate that bomb at the stadium., but we were too late when we've been teleported back here!"

Yugi's eyes widened at what Tristan just said before turning his head to Mokuba, "Mokuba, did the stadium blow up? What happened?" Even though the stadium being blown up wouldn't be a big deal because it's not even real, and even though they've been sent back to the rec room because the stage clear, they have no clue on how it would result in their stage quests, should it result in technical failure. Would it be bad, would it be worse, or not at all?

Bakura said, "Well, if you need to know, come and take a look."

"I gotta go, too," said Yugi. "Remember? I promised Grandpa I'd let him try out my helmet."

The three remaining boys exited their and took a seat in front of the TV. Joey sat on the same loveseat, this time with Yugi sitting next to him. Tristan and Duke sat back down onto the same separate chairs from before.

On the screen, they see a vast-looking map with land mostly covered in Nature's green and surrounded by its big, blue sea. It has a large mountain in the middle. On the right lower corner is another mountain, this one covered in ice, and right beside it is an area that looks to be like an ancient city. There is a lane planted in-between the city, leading to a tall tower.

Confused, Joey starts to ask, "So, uh, what are we lookin' at, Mokuba?"

"Well, isn't it obvious, Joey?"

"Enlighten me."

"This map shows the World of Trophies, a vast land where fighters roam around to take on every minion in sight. This... is the world we're gonna be taking on."

"Wow! We get to travel around there?" Tea asked.

Mokuba nodded.

"But, wait," Tristan asks, "what happened to the stadium? Where is it?"

"Your answer's over there," the young, bush-haired boy points to a small circle of darkness at the far left side of the screen.

Joey blinks, "Dat's the answer? All I see is some black hole."

"Well that's because that 'black hole' _is _the stadium, or **was**. When that bomb 'exploded', it sucked the entire stadium into its void."

"Wait, so dat stadium didn't really explode? Da bomb just created some kind of void?"

"Yes. I believe that bomb is called the Subspace Bomb. Also, as I said, that stadium was just the first level of this mode, so there's gonna be a lot more."

"Man, dat tiny little area is just the first? Dat's awesome!"

Bakura asks, "How long will it take before we this game?"

Mokuba rubs his chin, "Hmm, if we do this right, it'll probably take more than 5 hours."

"Five hours!?" yelled Tea. "Um, sounds fun and all, but some of us has school, you know."

"Relax, Tea," Mokuba assures, "You can come by after school everyday, unless you're still too busy with homework. It's not that big of a deal, _yet,_" that last word was in Mokuba's thoughts.

"That's good to know," said Yugi. He then raises wrist up to reveal his Data Band, "Well, anyway, I should head back to reality. I promised Grandpa "I'd let him use my helmet."

"Yeah, same here," said Joey, who is also raising up his wrist up, "I gotta see if Serenity's helmet is delivered yet."

Duke asked, "What's the point? Even if her helmet's delivered by now, I'm pretty sure she's smart enough to know how to use it after reading the instructions."

"Yeah," Tristan added, acting like he forgot what Joey said about going back to check his sister earlier, "Why're you checking on her, again?"

Joey gives an untrusting glare to the two boys across from him, making Tristan and Duke flinch a little. With arms crossed over his chest, he closes his eyes and said, "First of all, I'm checkin' on her because she doesn't know da code ta access here," he opens his eyes with a death glare, "an' second, I'm not leavin' her alone with any of you two flirts anymore." As an older brother, Joey always count on himself to protect Serenity. Tristan always had a thing for her for a long time. He admits that Tristan isn't all bad around Serenity. But then there's Duke. Joey did have a small hatred for Devlin, when he insulted him when they first met, forcing him to challenge him to a duel. When he lost, he was forced him to dress up as a giant dog. That was one of the most humiliating days of his entire life. But when Yugi, or Yami, stepped in and beat Duke at his own game of Dungeon Dice Monsters, he won Joey's freedom. Duke apologized for everything and wants to start over, so it all worked out in the end. However, when Joey finds out Duke is also flirting Serenity, he starts to dislike him again. Tristan was one thing, but having flirtatious guy with fangirls around him like Devlin laying eyes on Serenity, he knows that he _really _needs to look after her, especially after the KC Grand Championship tournament, he said that he's got a date with her, even though it turned out that Duke didn't really ask her out and she wasn't really visiting at that time anyway.

"Oh, come on, Joey," Duke pleaded, "I know we don't exactly give her enough space in the past, but can we at least escort her to the tower?"

"You call _dat _giving her space? No way! _I'm _gonna escort her."

"Well, I didn't say we're gonna give her space... That didn't come out right, didn't it?"

An anime-styled vein formed on the side of Joey's head. He yelled, "'No' means 'no'!"

As Tristan is about to open his mouth to get him to reconsider, but Mokuba interrupts the argument loudly, "ANYWAY, who's up for level 2: Skyworld?" Everyone looked back at the map, there is an exclamation mark floating above a red destination mark located on top of a cloud above the lands. "On this level, we can start traveling even further. So who wants to be next?"

The others looks at each other. Joey turns to Mokuba, "Eh, I'd love to, but like I said, I gotta get back right quick to see Serenity."

"Oh. Well that's okay, Guys, the others can do the next stage."

"Eh, sorry, Mokuba," said Bakura, "I just remembered I have some errands to run right quick."

" Um, that's fine. Just me, Tea, Tristan, and Duke, then?"

Duke scratches the top of his head, "Yeah, uh, I got some errands to do, too, back at my game shop."

Mokuba gave a disappointed sigh, "Couldn't you guys have done your errands BEFORE you come here?"

"I forgot, Mokuba. We'll come back, so just chill."

"But the game requires a full house of 4 players. We can't start another mission with just the 3 of us!"

"Mokuba, would ya relax," Joey cheers him up as he lifts his wrist up, "Most will come back, so don't put your underpants in a twist." Mokuba watch as every other boy, except Tristan, repeat the same method as Joey is. Each of their Data Bands form around their wrist. They scrolled down on the holographic screens and selects Logout. They all virtually disappeared within seconds.

Tristan hops up from his leathery chair, "Say, Tea, since the others will be gone for a while, how about we start Round 2 at arcade basketball, huh?"

The female brunette in pink sighed and shrugged, "Why not?" She got up from her seat and Mokuba watch as she follows the tall brunet to the basketball section, "Just promise me you'll go easy on me this time."

"Yeah, that'll happen."

"Dork." Right now, Tea is really hoping that Serenity would be here today, and soon, too, because she needs some female friends.

Mokuba remained sitting on the couch. He sighed, "Guess we'll have to wait then."

* * *

><p>Joey and Serenity materialized somewhere in the city from midair. Joey was the first to land on the ground. He landed on a concrete sidewalk before quickly caught his sister in his arms, who was about to fall on her butt. "Whew. Thanks for breaking my fall, Big Bro," she giggled.<p>

"No problem, Lil Sis," he replied as he let the redhead stand on her feet.

Serenity wears a light-pink suit with a matching hairband with big, triangular cat ears and a curled tuft in the middle, with its dangling almost between her brown eyes. There's also a small knob on the center of her chest. She looks around the current area for a moment. "Wow! This place is amazing," she said in awe.

"Yeah, I'm gonna need some time to get used to this place, too," Joey said, also looking around the city. "I hafta admit: Kaiba and Pegasus really outdone demselves 'dis time. But if you think _'dis _place is cool, wait 'til we get ta Smash Tower."

She looks back at her brother, "What's Smash Tower, Joey?"

He looks back at her, "It's da longest building in da stage. It's located at the center of the city."

"Wow. What do you guys do there?"

As soon as the blonde sibling is about to open his mouth to explain, a familiar male voice cried out, "Hey! Joey!" The two Wheelers turned their heads to see Yugi waving his hand and running towards them up ahead, with Duke and Bakura behind. Joey looked surprised when he saw Yugi again, and not his Grandpa. The trio reached up to the siblings.

Joey began, "Yugi? I thought you were gonna let Gramps borrow yer game helmet."

"I was, but he changed his mind when he decided to go to the store with Professor Hawkins and Rebecca."

"Da Hawkins came to visit?"

"Yeah. Although, even if Rebecca is gone, I'm still blocking my door with my wardrobe because I don't exactly trust her being in my room while my mind is elsewhere," he said while he scratches the back of his head.

Joey smirked and mocked him, "Why, 'cause you don't want her to mess with your wittle toys?"

Serenity giggles, "His toys?"

The blonde warrior in green whispers with his left hand covering his mouth, "Yeah. Dude's a Duel Monsters champ in High School an' he still plays with his action figures in his room."

**"Hey!"** Yugi obviously heard that. "Those toys contains fond memories!" He has a fiery blush across his face. Serenity giggled some more.

"Hey, Serenity," Duke says in his usual charming tone, "I like your outfit. It looks really good on you."

"Thanks," she responds, "I'm dressed as Jigglypuff, a balloon-like creature from Pokémon, even though I'm in a rubber jumpsuit, and I'm hardly dressed as a balloon."

"I see your sister's helmet finally came, Joey," Bakura commented.

"Yep. Her helmet just got delivered as soon as I logged off."

Yugi stopped blushing and said, "That's cool! Welcome to Smash Bros., Serenity."

"Thanks, Yugi."

"So... shall we head back to the tower?"

"Yeah, before Mokuba starts to make another fit," Joey declared. "Man, I don't know WHY playing the Adventure Mode is SO important to dat kid."

Bakura shrugged in response, "Maybe he just want more company." The white-haired teen has a point; being the brother of KaibaCorp's current president, Mokuba spends more time working with him with certain things than hang out with anybody, and he seems to not have the time either.

"Well, whateva," said Joey, "Let's just get to da tower."

Yugi nodded, "Let's go."

* * *

><p>Duke and Bakura had finished their errands with very less time. It only took Joey a few minutes to set up Serenity's helmet. On the way back, Duke wanted to escort Serenity to the Smash Tower, but of course, Joey would give a threating stare, making him change his mind.<p>

As the five walked of the elevator, Serenity looked around the rec room. "Wow, this place is so cool!" She then looks at the TV off in the distance. "Wow! There's even a TV here!"

As the boys watch the redhead walk to the TV, they looked around to see that Tea, Tristan, and Mokuba are nowhere to be seen. "Hey! Guys," Joey calls out, no answer. "Where'd they go?"

Yugi replied, "I don't know. You don't think they're...?"

"No," said now-it-all Duke, "Mokuba said they have to have four fighters confirmed to play a stage mission."

Bakura said, "Well, then where could they-"

"Hey, guys?" Serenity's call made the boys turn their heads to her, who is standing in front of the TV screen. Why is the TV loading?" She asked that as the screen is indeed loading.

* * *

><p><strong>Sorry it took me awhile to update. I didn't have writer's block, I was just too occupied with life, and I was taking a break after writing a chapter with over 5000 words for the first time, in less than 10 days. I may update faster if I get more reviews for support (hopefully). Also, if there's a flaw in this chapter, let me know, I'll fix it.<strong>


	14. Chapter 14

**(AN: The bolded dialog means that someone is speaking from a different end/side/dimension. Example: when a person is in an Adventure Mode stage, and hears people speaking to him/her/them in their head, their dialog would be bolded. Read and review, please. Appreciate it!) **

"What are you talking about, sis?" Joey walks to the living room area. Yugi, Bakura and Duke follows.

"This TV screen is loading. Why is it doing that? Huh?" Joey explained to his sister what they've been doing on the way to the tower. He also told her that there has to be 4 fighters transferred if they want to do a mission. The screen stopped and immediately showed a flat cloud surrounded by walls and ceiling made of clouds. Serenity sees a familiar young boy materialize on the platform-like could. The boy is wearing some kind of combat clothing and has ears and a tail of a fox. "Hey! Is that Mokuba?"

"Hey, it is," said Joey, standing behind the three-man couch with the other boys as they watch the preteen stand on the cloud. Yugi's not sure how he is able to stand on a cloud, considering that clouds are **not** solid.

Mokuba hops off the solid cloud. He soars down through bigger, normally gaseous clouds. He positions himself upright, and lands on a brown, brick platform hanging off the cloud wall. He jumps off from the platform, and lands on another, this time a floating platform with a light, turquoise, rotating box in the middle. The transparent box has a big, orange sphere inside it. Mokuba kicks the box, when it busted, a plain, paper fan with a red grip clamping down half of the folded material**[7]**. He picks it up and jumps down further.

"He's in Skyworld," said a surprised Yugi.

A more surprised Duke said, "But I thought he said there has to be 4 players, unless..."

"...They found a fourth participant," Bakura finished.

"Hmm," said Joey as he looks down to spot a silver intercom lying on the table, like the one Mokuba described to communicate with fighters in the TV. With one hand for support, he vaulted over the couch and sat on it.

Mokuba lands on cloud-covered ground and head towards a high, brown platform to his left. The floor up there has another rotating box on top. He jumps up to the brick wall, but it wasn't high enough. However, he managed to make an additional jump off an invisible platform in the air.

Yugi's eyes widen at Mokuba's second jump, "Woah! How did he...?"

"He can do double jumps, Yugi," Joey explains. "In the original, fighters can jump twice. In this version, so can we." The blonde boy finds a button on the intercom. He presses it.

After jumping onto the high platform, Mokuba kicks the second box. When he destroyed it, stickers takes its place. As he touches al of them, they vanished. "More stickers for our collection," he said to himself before running further.

**"Hey! Mokuba! Come in!"**

Someone's call caught Mokuba by surprise, but not enough to stop him from dashing towards a red door at the end of the platform. The door doesn't seem to be behind or attached to a building "Joey, is that you?"

**"Yeah. Me and the others just came back, and Serenity's with us now. Hey, how'd you guys...?"**

"Uh, wait a minute, Joey," Mokuba interrupts as he makes to the door. When he opens it, it shows a wormhole in the middle of outer space. The bushy-haired kid into the door, swirling into the blue warping hole.

* * *

><p>Mokuba gets materialized onto a small, stone island, surrounded by an ocean of white fluff. The fan he just had disappeared. He presses his right index finger against his ear, "OK, you were saying, Joey?"<p>

**"Well, for starters, the place you're on right now is a killer view on the TV from our side. Second, how are ya able to play in another Adventure Mode stage? I thought you said you can't play with just the three of you."**

"Uh, yeah, about that... See, while you guys were gone-" A familiar, slow whooshing sound interrupted Mokuba, his and his artificial tail blows against aggressing wind. He turned around and saw something moving up the surface of the clouds, like a shark's fin moving up an ocean or sea's surface. The only similarities between those comparisons have in common is that they both represent trouble and danger. The objects seem to look like cannons. Mokuba can tell what those cannons blong to, and so can Yugi and Joey.

More of the object emerge up from the clouds. Every cloud it makes contact with becomes tinted with red-orange, and the polluting color spreads across the cloudy sea. Familiar bat wings sticks out, and the battleship from the stadium came into view. "Halberd..." Mokuba described the "masked" ship.

As the ship turns to the young boy's direction, it opened up its door underneath, releasing more dark balls of fuzz onto the solidified clouds. It slowly glides over Mokuba's head, releasing hundreds of more fuzzes.

Joey sits in the middle of the couch while Yugi and his sister sits between him and Bakura and Duke lean against each arm. They look at the fuzzy, purple orbs falling around Mokuba. "What are thoses things," asked Serenity.

**"I think they're called Shadow Bugs," **Mokuba's voice answered, **"They're balls of fuzz the assemble into individual piles, and those piles form creatures called Primids."**

"The fuzzes we've encountered in the first stage," said Yugi.

As they see the Halberd stopped unloading the Shadow Bugs, it slowly flies away. The black-centered purple fuzzes surrounding Mokuba started to gather into separate piles. The piles immediately form into the soldier creatures. They close in on him like zombies.

Serenity gasps in horror, "Mokuba, get out of there!"

A grin is drawn across the preteen's young face, "Don't worry, Serenity. It'll take more than these losers to get me scared." Before the Primds could get even closer, Mokuba jumps off the stone island. He performs his Fire Fox attack, his body has been encased in flames. Feeling the energy within his virtual body as he charges up, he flips his body to where he is headfirst towards the cloudy ground. "FIRE!" He shot himself through the clouds like a cannon, creating a large hole in the cloudy floor.

As the Primids walk to the hole, they looked down and found their target landing on another flat cloud floating above a long, brick platform stage that is also floating. He teasingly waves his hand at them. He then hears Duke's over the intercom, **"Uh, Mokuba? How'd you know where to...?"**

"My brother and Pegasus gave this version of Super Smash Brothers a bunch of different details. Seto told me where to go from up there."

**"That's awesome, Mokuba," **Serenity complimented.

"Aw, thanks, Serenity!"

**"Mokuba," **cried Yugi, **"Watch out!"**

The warning made Mokuba look up to see some of the Primids hop down the still-existing hole in the clouds. Two landed between the each edge of the lower platform. Mokuba glanced around his surroundings and looked up to see more Primids jumping through the cloud hole. "This... may take minute.

As the falling soldiers are about to kick Mokuba with the soles of their feet, he runs to the edge of the cloud platform and flipped off of it, making the them land without hit. Before a couple of Primids had time to react, the one upfront met face-to-face with sole of a certain tracker boot. The momentum knocked the front soldier to the soldier behind it. The front Primid remained on the edge, but the back one fell off the stage, plummeting into the depths of Skyworld. After performing the kick, Mokuba backflipped once and landed on his feet, beginning a combat stance.

The observers exclaims in awe. "Nice kick, Mokuba!" Joey complimented.

**"Thanks, Joey!"**

The floating stage starts to motion down like an elevator.

As the nearest Primids attempts an attack on Mokuba, he turns around and kicks the soldier off the stage. He then turns around again to see three more of these fiends charging at him with their fists ready. With another grin, the boy gets into a "ready, set, go" position and performs a dash across the floor so fast that a person would miss if they had blinked. Blue afterimages of himself traced his steps before quickly disappear. The dash was strong enough to have the enemies flying in the air before falling on their backs nearly cutting their health bars in half. As soon as the Primids could recover, Mokuba comes at them and performs a barrage of kicks on each of them, reducing their life bars to zero and automatically knocking them out of the box.

Three more Primids falls from the sky. The first one landed behind Mokuba. It kicked him a few feet away, but the boy managed to maintain balance. As he turn to face the first Primid, the other two also landed behind him, the first one charging up a punch, orange energy forming around its fist. As it launched the punch, Mokuba ducked and charges up for another attack. This time, his body glows yellow as he feels more supernatural energy within his virtual body. When he's done charging, he swings his right foot at the two Primids, knocking them out of the box as their health bars went down completely from just one strike.

The last Primid charges at the boy. It jumps into the air, almost hitting the upper platform, and does a flying kick at him. Mokuba is once again caught off-balance and uncontrollably ran backwards and fell off the edge of the stage. In the nick of time, he grabbed onto the ledge with his left hand.

Serenity and the boys watch in horror as their young friends dangles off the ledge while his percentage rose up to at least 30. Bakura watched the Primid coming closer to him. "Mokuba, he's coming!" he cried.

In response to Bakura's warning, Mokuba whips out his Blaster laser gun from his holster with his free hand. The young boy starts to grab on the ledge with his other hand and brings his left up on it for an extra boost. He aims the black weapon at the slowly approaching Primid and starts shooting pink, rapid-fire lasers at it. The soldier-like creature, however, did not flinch at all, but its health bar doesn't remain the same, it already went more then halfway down.

As soon as the Primid went close enogh, it tries to stomp on Mokuba's busy hand, but its health got reduced completely and it was knocked off the stage automatically. "Ok, I think that's all of them, for now," he said as he lifts himself up onto the ledge.

When a flash of light occurred, the stage stopped moving, and stairs appeared under and lead to another platform. Mokuba finally managed to stand on his feet.

**"Way to kick butt, Mokuba!"**

"Thanks, Joey." He discovers the stairs. He sticks his Blaster back in his holster, trotted up the stairs and ran across the next floor, as he does, he was zapped by a purple ball of electricity. When the attack made him fall on his bottom, he looked up to see a Spaak floating in front of him. The cloudlike monster uses its Tesla Coils to shoot another thunder ball at him. He brings his knees to his chest and bounces back on his feet. He then runs his fingers along the hexagonal device strapped to his left hip. The device's core glows, and then a blue aura shot out of it. The aura formed into an hexagonal shield around him, reflecting the thunder projectile back at the Spaak when it made contact.

The Spaak was hit by its own thunder orb, it took a quite amount of damage and its body turned from white to black. Mokuba then leaps up twice and flip-kicked the Spaak, destroying it. When he lands, he runs even further through the area, only to be chased by o Primids and another Spaak.

**"Mokuba, behind you!" **cried Bakura.

As he turned back and saw the enemies approaching him, another item spawned in front of his feet, a white, disk-like object with red outlines and a large "B" on the white center**[8]**. "Sweet! A Smart Bomb!" He picks the bomb up and threw it at his enemies. The cloud creature lowered closely to the ground enemies. When the object hit one of the Primids, it created a slow, but massive, explosion, catching all three monsters in its devastating blast. The blow was damaging enough to destroy them all.

Mokuba could hear the cheering from his friends from the other side, he also heard Joey yell, "Ka-blam!", which made him amused. As he turns around, two more Primids are seen, under a low, cloud ceiling, the one in front is a Boom Primid. The boomerang-wielding soldier throws its yellow weapon at him. Mokuba ducks while, at the same time, gets into another "ready, set, go" position, and does another illusion-like mad dash through them, cutting most of their health bars.

It didn't take long for them to recover, when they did, Mokuba whips out his Blaster like he's on High Noon and immediately starts shooting at his targets, knocking them out of sight as their health drained.

As he turns around, the next thing he sees is a chrome-coated, spherical robot floating above a small platform**(5)**. It has four metal parts surrounding its body. The watchers can see the orbicular robot on the TV. Yugi was the first to ask, "What is that thing?"

**"It's a Cymul. It uses its four reflectors to, well, reflect projectiles." **He finishes from his end, "And if someone gets near it, it'll use its reflector parts to spin rapidly. Though, I'm pretty sure they don't move." He noticed there is yet another box atop the small platform. He remembers there being a healing item or two in there. Healing items tend to reduce damage. He looks up at his damage percentage, it went up to 39%. He sighed and thinks, _Guess it's a risk I have to take, if I want to lower the chance to fail this mission for all of us._

He runs to the box. He carefully jumped onto the platform and avoids the Cymul. He punches the box, revealing a big tomato with a large "M" on it**[9]**.

"Awesome! A Maxim Tomato!" The boy picks up the tomato and raises it up in the air victoriously. But before he could see it coming, the spherical robot lowered itself closer to his hand and extended its reflectors. Mokuba's raised glove got caught in one of its reflectors and the Cymul starts spinning wildly. The long-haired preteen whirls around like a ceiling fan.

Yugi and the others gasped at this.

Mokuba starts screaming, " HEY! THIS ISN'T SUPPOSE TO HAPPEN!" He lost grip on the Maxim Tomato, it flew away as he continues screaming. When the chrome machine stops spinning, it flung Mokuba far away to the other side of the area. He rolled far away over the next platform before sliding on his frontside and finally stopped.

**"Mokuba! You alright, buddy?" **Called Duke.

The preteen slowly props himself off the ground. He rubs his head, groaning. Apparently a player can still feel something while they're still virtual. He responds, "Yeah, I'm, just as long as I get that tomato before I get into a mini-boss battle." As soon as he said it, another flash of light occurred, and something landed from the sky. He turns around to see a creature with a small, literally red head. It controls a giant cauldron-like vehicle with two big wheels underneath for movement, and two devastatingly massive scythe-like arms**(6)**. It also has a handle on its big that makes it look almost like a baby carriage.

The new monster swings its sickles at Mokuba. Before the panicked boy could get away, it was too late. He was knocked through the barrier and he disappeared completely.

The gang started to hear one of the tube-shaped pods at the left side of the TV whirring. It opened up. They watch smoke coming out. When the smoke clears out, it reveals Mokuba sitting on the floor picking his right ear. "I really shouldn't have jinxed myself."

"Hmph, now you know how I felt from the first stage," said Joey with his arms crossed over his chest.

Yugi starts asking, "Wait, so who's next?"

"And who's going to have to face that scary monster?" asked a worried Serenity.

**"I am," **said the voice of a familiar female voice. Everyone turned back to the television.

Serenity discovers a brunette in the screen in a pink dress and has a gold crown on her head. "Tea?"

"Yeah," she replied from her end, staring at the menacing creature before her. The big enemy has a health bar above it that is about as long as five regular enemy health bars combined. She gulps, "Judging by the really long life bar, I'm guessing this is a boss battle, right?"

**"You guessed it," **answered Mokuba.

She backs away, "Any weaknesses? What's this thing called?"

**"Its weak spot is probably the head. We can see the name on the TV, it's called a Greap, which I think is short for Grim Reaper."**

"Huh. That makes sense." Tea takes a deep breath and makes her frying pan appear in her hand. The Greap swings its left scythe at her. She drops the pan and pulls out her Toad from... someplace. A powerful force pushed the huge blade away as it hits the little mushroom boy, chipping down some of the "pot driver's" health. With a triumphant laugh, she puts the Toad away, picks up her frying pan, and tries to jump onto the enemy's head. In response to her jumping, the creature jumps up and swings its axes around. The brunette in pink was caught on the blades, taking damage in midair.

The others gasps as she takes 32% of damage.

The monster stopped spinning and dropped back to the ground, and so did Tea. She fell on her back, but she recovers with no time at all. She looks up at the creature, it raises its twin blade all the way up as it does a slight wheelie on its two wheels. Tea blocks eyes with her free arm. The monster slams its scythe-like arms into the ground.

Tea slowly moves her arm a little and opened her eyes midway to see what happened. As she opens them quickly and moves her arm away, she finds herself in-between two of the scythes, they were implanted deeply into the ground. She looks at the Greap, it tries to roll itself backwards, but it seems to have trouble getting its scythes out. "Hey! Its blades are stuck!"

**"Now's your chance, Tea," **said Bakura with encouraging words, **"Go for it!"**

She nodded, "Right!" She gets up, makes a parasol appear in her hand and performs her character's recovery move. She soars up through the air with her pink umbrella pointing straight out like a lancer and the frying pan in her other hand. She opens it up and landed slowly the handle on the Greap's back.

She puts her parasol away and starts whacking its head with her frying pan, repeatedly. Its health quickly drops almost halfway. The Greap still struggles to get the scythes out. Tea hits the head as hard as she can.

The pot driving monster finally managed to pluck its scythes out from the platform. It swings its axe-like arms around, but misses Tea, who is still bangaing on its head. It even tries spinning itself around to throw her off, but Tea quickly wraps her other arm around its neck-less head just in time and continues her whacking. Her feet-heels clenches onto the side of the cauldron-like vehicle.

Her friends cheer as they see the Greap's long health bar get lower and lower.

"You can do it, Tea," cheered Yugi.

After attempted blade-swinging, multiple spinning and torturous head trauma, the mini-boss' health bar reached to the size of a pea. Tea jumps off its handle before turning back to face it. She brings her light frying pan over to the back of her shoulder, and flings it at the dizzy Greap . When the pan hit its head, it blasted out of the barrier.

Another flash of light appeared around the area. Tea sees a red door appear by the edge.

**"Nice job, Tea!"**

**"Yeah, you showed dat Greap creep!"**

She giggled, "Why, thanks, guys."

Mokuba said, **"Ok, Tea, now all you have to do is enter through that door over there and you can explore further."**

"Ok, I'm off."

* * *

><p><strong>Enemies: <strong>

**(5) - Cymul: It can reflect most projectiles. It will use its four reflectors to spin rapidly. It can also lap around a platform, or just move vertically and horizontally.**

**(6) - Greap: It uses its large, scythe-like arms to attack. Its weaknesses is its small, red head. It has two attacks, the first is that it hits both of its blades into the ground, however, its scythes will get stuck into the ground. the second is that if a player try jumping, it will swing both scythes into the air.T**

**Items:**

**[7] - Fan: It has vey weak rapid attacks and can be an effective KO-ing projectile when thrown. **

**[8] - Smart Bomb: It is one of the most thrown items in the game. Once it hits an opponent, travels certain distance, or gets attacked, it produces a large, slow explosion that envelops a big range and damages everyone inside in increments of 1% for about three seconds.**

**[9] - Maxim Tomato: Subtracts 50% of damage from the person who picks (or eats it in this case).**


	15. Chapter 15

Tea materialized at midair, or rather high air, very, very high air. She screams as she starts falling, her brown hair and her lovely pink dress blows upward. She stops screaming and blocks her face with her arms as she plummets face-first through clouds. After she "feeling" no more clouds, she moves her arms to see, she discovers levels of slopes as she passes by. Each slope has what looks to be like a tire with an eyeball**(7)**. Each "tire" also has three yellow lines that cuts the tire-like shells into three equal sides. Tea then falls down between two walls of clouds. As she continues to fall, she looks down again and sees another flat, cloudy platform, but this one is lavender in color.

"Uh, I should probably bring out my parasol."

Before she could reach for it, Mokuba says from the intercom, **"That won't be necessary, Tea. In this game, you take no damage when landing after falling from an extreme height. You can fall from a 30-story building and you can still land without dying or taking any damage."**

Tea sighed of relief "Well, that's good to know." She drops down from the cloudy walls and landed on the purple cloud platform. It started to move, taking her down to another area.

As it reaches above the nearest platform, it disappears into it, having its passenger to land her red heels slowly onto the hard, brick floor.

She looks at what's ahead of her. She sees a floating spike ball**(8) **hovering up and down between her platform and another one with equal size. Another spike ball is hovering left and right above the second floor. These spike-embedded spheres are purple, and they have electric aura surrounding their bodies. Behind the spiked balls, she sees what to resemble a Ferris wheel rotating counterclockwise, more Primids, Spaaks, Jyks, and those tire-like monsters, and even more clouds and platforms.

The brunette looks up at her score, it rose up to 32%. She sighed. "Okay, I can do this," she says to herself before she smiles, "after all, I did kick Yugi, Joey a d Tristan's butts yesterday."

**"Hey! I heard that," **Joey yelled. She giggled.

A small staff with a pointed tip and a candy cane design**[10]** appeared and stood upright on its flat end in front of her feet. It has small, glowing star on top of the tip. She grabs the stick off the floor. "Alright, time to show these creatures what a 'damsel in distress' can do," she declares determinedly and independently, "starting with these weird-looking spike balls over there."

Tea doesn't know what does this star-topped rod, but she has a feeling that she will demolish any foe with it, thanks to female intuition. She holds the rod over her head and starts charging at the electric spike ball with a battle cry. The ball rose up to her level just in time. As she attempts to clobber the creature, she was bounced off by an invisible force field around the spike ball. The rod slipped out of her hands and she fell on the platform floor, adding 10% to her damage score. She exclaims in pain as the star rod fell on top of her, adding 5% to her score.

Mokuba sighed as he has his arms crossed, "I wouldn't try that again if I were you, Tea. Those are Jyks. Jyks have no health bars, but therefore, they can't be touched, and if you even try to touch one or not, you'll get hurt."

The brunette gets up while rubbing her "aching" head, groaning a little, "I wish you could've told me sooner."

**"Sorry."**

She picks up her rod-like weapon and turns to her next path up ahead, "Well, if I can't do anything about those 'Jyks', I'll go ahead and move on." With that, she hops up in the air, makes an additional hop, and she suddenly starts floating.

The others exclaims in surprise. "How is she doing that?" Bakura asked.

**"I learned that my character can float around in midair."**

"That's really cool, Tea," Yugi compliments.

** "Yeah, but for a limited time, every time I do this." **

She starts flowing through the air over the second platform and reaches towards the "Ferris wheel". The platforms are hanging off the rotating wheel. She stopped floating and managed to land on one of these platforms just in time. As the wheel rotates nonstop, she waited until the platform she's on reaches the next platform. There are two levels platform, the one on top has another wheel monster rolling along it with a Spaak patrolling above. The second one down below seems pretty clear. There's a cloud platform in-between them. As she reaches the next platforms, she hops onto the flat cloud and then jumps onto the edge of the lower one.

**"Tea! Watch out for that Glunder!"**

Tea looks ahead and saw another wheel-shaped monster rolling towards her way.

**"Don't let that thing get close to you!"**

But it was too late. When the Glunder had gotten close enough, it stopped. Its three shells popped open, revealing some organic structure around the eye. A powerful surge of electricity emanates from the Glunder's body, making contact to Tea's. She "felt" the electrical current dance around her body, rising her percentage score to over 50 and making it a darkening red.

**"Tea!"**

It didn't take long for the brunette to stop being electrocuted. The Glunder's shells closed back up. Managed to recover quickly, she takes the rod in her hand, and whacks the small creature away, instantly destroying it. "What _was_ that?" she asked.

**"They're called Glunders, they'll shock you if you or they get close enough."**

Joey says, **"I gotta say Tea, dat situation is pretty... _shocking. _Nyehehehehe!"**

An imaginary vein popped on Tea's forehead, "That's not funny, Joey."

**"Yeah, Joey. That was not cool."**

**"Not funny at all."**

**"Yeah, um, I hate to agree, Big Brother, but that joke was... pretty lame."**

**"Ugh, everybody's a critic."**

As Tea is about to trot further, a small orb of violet electricity plummeted to the ground in front of her feet made her stop in her tracks. She looks up to see a Spaak floating above her. It launches another ball of thunder at her. She gasps in a slight panic.

**"Tea, have your arms in an 'X' shaped over your chest," **advised Mokuba.

"What? Why?"

**"Just do it! Trust me!"**

The brunette isn't sure about this, but she decides to go for it. She crosses her arms in an "X" shape over her chest as told. Before the shock ball could reach her, a pink sphere formed around her body. The Spaak's attack disappeared as it made contact with the sphere. In surprise, she uncrossed her arms, when she did, the pink shield.

Yugi asks, "How did she do that?"

"When a fighter crosses his or her arms to an "X", you'll be protected by a shield," Mokuba explained.

"Oh, yeah! Just like in the game where press a button to make the shield appear," Joey added.

"That's really fascinating," said Bakura.

"Yeah, you can block almost any attack with this move. But don't use too long, 'cause as you use it for a long time, it'll start shrinking. It also shrinks every time it gets hit, and if it shrinks all the way down into your chest, you'll ne stunned momentarily."

**"Well, that's good to know,"** said Tea.

She looks up and saw the cloudlike creature charging up for a lightning attack. "Aah!" She lifts her dress up and ran to the other end of the platform, dodging the lightning attack. She jumps off the edge and landed on one of the cloud platforms ahead. She's been chased by the wicked Spaak. It launches yet another thunder ball at Tea, but she dodged it once again.

Just then, she noticed that the star on her rod's top started to glow.

**"Tea, with every powerful swing, you can launch stars from your Star Rod," **Mokuba called out.

"Okay." She grips the rod with both hands and swung it like a baseball bat. A bigger star escaped from the star tip, hitting the Spaak right in the face, reducing half of its health. With a triumphant laugh, she repeats the same maneuver. Another star shot out as she swings her Star Rod once more. It blasts the cloud demon out of sight.

As soon as she is about to do a victory air pump, a Boom Primid came out of nowhere and appeared before her. "Uh-oh." The Primid throws its large boomerang at the "princess". With quick thinking, she drops the stick and whips out Toad. The little mushroom-headed child created a powerful force that bounced the yellow boomerang away. It knocked the soldier away. "Hmm. I probably won't be needing a shield for protection as long as I have this little cutie."

She turns and ran away, lifting her dress up again. She hops onto another platform, this one is different, though. Some of the floors emerge up and down alternatively like some kind of elevators. "Hmm, that's interesting." Thr first elevating floor in front of her resurfaces with the platform, two lines across the floor indicates the part of the floor rises up. She hurried up and jumps on it. The floor lifts her up, almost all the way to the cloud platforms above.

She tries to jump over to another moving floor. While jump through the air horizontally, a Primid came through a cloud platform and kicks her down with the bottom of its feet. She plummeted to the hard floor, but quickly recovers. She looked to see her attacker landing in front of her. Irked, she stands and said, " Oh, you messed with the wrong girl, buddy."

As she's about to whack the Primid with her Star Rod, she was met with a powerful kick-and-punch combo. That nasty attack sent her flying out of the stage, blasting into lights.

Everyone yelled her name.

Moments later, Tristan came into view. "Don't worry, guys. I'll take it from here," he said with words full of determination.

**"Wow. Tristan, is that you?"**

That familiar voice made Tristan turn from a serious fighter to a blushing softy. "Uh, hey, Serenity. Nice that you came to watch." He closes his eyes, scratching the back of his head.

**"Thanks," **she giggled.

**"Tristan, look out!"**

Tristan opens his eyes and sees a Primid standing in front of him, the same Primid that took out Tea. He's been materialized directly where Tea last stood. It lunged at Tristan, but Tristan jumped out of the way just in time.

As soon as the soldier got up and turned around, it finds itself getting kneed in the stomach by the tall teen. He wraps his left hand around his right fist and slammed the heck out of this creature, destroying it.

**"Nice one, Tristan!" **

"Thanks, Mokuba. I'm gonna go further, now." With that, he reaches his hands up to the sky. When he does so, a recoinnosance camera virtually appeared between his hands. The ring-shaped satellite-like device flew up in the air, and took Tristan with it.

* * *

><p>Tristan arrives at another long platform. He walks across the brown, brick lane, down a small slope.<p>

**"Keep your eyes peeled, Tristan," **advised Yugi. **"You'll never know what surprises this game has in store for, especially if it's a game that's been modified by Kaiba and Pegasus."**

**"You realize, I'm sitting in the same room as you, right!?" **yelled Mokuba. Tristan laughs.

"Relax, Yuge. Everything seems calm for now... He stopped in his tracks. He walked all the to the middle of flat ground. "Too calm."

A flash of light appeared around the area. Three Primids, one of them a Boom Primid, appeared out nowhere. A Spaak appeared above him. The brunet looks around his surroundings. If this is his real body, a drop of sweat would slide down his face.

"Oh no. Tristan's in trouble," Serenity looked worried.

A small grin came across the teen mercenary, "Don't sweat it, Serenity. I'll take these guys out in no time," he declared, cracking his virtual neck and knuckles. "Come on!"

The Spaak charges up an lightning attack, electricity course through the 8 Tesla Coils surrounding its body.

Tristan dashes towards a Primid in front of him. As the soldier tries to punch the brunet, he somersaulted right passed it. As the Primid looked both ways, it found itself in a chokehold from behind by Tristan. It struggled to free itself while the tall teen managed to effortlessly keep it restraint.

A Bob-omb appeared behind Tristan's feet.

Everyone in the room gasped. Duke yelled, "Tristan, there's a Bob-omb behind you!"

"Huh?" said a confused Tristan.

The Boom Primid discovered the little bomb-like character and took this opportunity to throw its boomerang at it. The yellow tool soars its way to the black explosive. The two items clanked from contact, the bomb exploded.

The chock held Primid blasted off the stage, but Tristan only flew off a little before landing on his back, taking at least 30% of damage. A normal Primid approaches him. Tristan raised his head up and brings his knees to his chest and kicks the monster offscreen while regaining his footing at the same time.

As soon as he stood back up, another Primid materialized behind and pushed him. He managed to keep balanced, but as soon as he does, the Spaak does a midair flip and released a powerful lightning bolt at him. As it struck him, he fell back on the ground. His damage percentage rose up to more 60.

"Tristan!" yelled Tea.

"Man, he is taking some quick, heavy damage," stated Joey.

Tristan once again got up from the ground. If this was real life, he'd probably be to weak to move, or even breathe. Just then, a gift from the Gods of this place has materialized in front of him, a long, greenish cannon with some buttons on it**[11]**. "Aw, yeah! A Cracker Launcher! This baby could turn things around." He quickly stood back up and picks up the launcher with both hands. "Alright, losers," he says with a Latin accent as he aims the cannon at his enemies, "say 'hello' to my little friend."

He rapidly shoots balls of firecrackers at all enemies. At last one hit took out an enemy instantly each. The Primids and the Spaak blasted away. More Primids and another Spaak showed up, but they lasted no longer as the armed teen blasted them away with the Cracker Launcher.

**"Go, Tristan!"**

Two more Primids appear, and the Cracker Launcher is empty. "Uh-oh. Out of ammo. Oh well." He threw the cannon at the front Primid, reducing most of its HP as it made contact.

Tristan plants a C4 bomb onto the ground before dash towards the last remaining soldiers. When he got close to them, he flips over their heads, making his friends gasp. He lands behind the two soldiers. Before they could even turn around, Tristan delivers a heavy kick to them. The Primid upfront was knocked out of the box while the closer one was kicked all the way to where the C4 is, and landed on top of it. As it tries to get up, Tristan pulls out a walkie-talkie and speaks into it, "Now!"

That code word sent a signal to the rectangular bomb. It exploded, sending the last Primid flying.

"Hmm," he makes smirk, but it quickly disappeared as another creature appeared, a monster that looks like a stationary turret**(9)**. It has a skull-resembling face in the middle with three eyes and has 4 bolts on the side of its face in equal positions. It's also armed with two machine guns on each side. Before Tristan has time to reach, the new monster rotated to his direction and shoots laser bullets at him. Almost all of the bullets hit him, and it was enough to blast him off the stage.

"Aw, man," Joey started, "Now Tristan's out of the picture, literally."

One of the tubular pods opened up, revealing a really exhausted Tristan. He walks over to the living room set to take a seat.

"Now that most of you are out," Yugi asks, "who's the fourth player?"

"Yeah. We tried to ask you dat, who is dis fourth fighter, anyway?"

"There's your answer. Look," Mokuba points at the TV screen, revealing a person in an orange, robotic suit. He wears a red helmet with a green, see-through covering and he has a cannon for a right arm.

Serenity asks, "Woah, who's that?"

"Watch out for that Roturret!" Mokuba warned.

The Roturret rotates again and tries to blast at the armored stranger. The person jumps up to dodge it before performing a "drill kick" on it, making it rotate uncontrollably. The person lands on the ground and fires fiery blasts up at it with its cannon, reducing the HP quickly.

"Woah, he's good," Duke complimented.

"Indeed," added Bakura.

The person then fires three missiles at it, one at a time. He then uses the cannon-arm again to charge up a powerful ball of energy. It grows bigger as he keeps charging.

The Roturret keeps missing every shot at this stranger, due to it being a little too big fire both its guns at him.

As the person stopped charging, he lets the machine have it. He shot a giant energy ball at the monster, almost reducing all of its life points. He jumps up to do an upside-down drill kick, which is enough power to knock the machine gun monster away. Another flash of light appeared.

**"Alright! I think that'll do it for this stage. Fantastic job!"**

The armored person runs up a slope that was up ahead. As he made it to the top, he sees a heavenly light up ahead, there's a golden door before light. Very well-fitting that there'd be heavenly light in a heavenly world. The ran up and walked through the golden door.

"And that's all for this level," Mokuba declared.

Joey says, "Man, did all dat guy? He took no damage and took dat thing out quick!"

"How come _you_ can't be that good in battle, Joey? Hmm?" Tristan teases him.

Normally, Joey would be irked and say something, like, "Yeah, look who's talking", but decides to ignore him this time, "Whateva. I just can't wait ta see dis guy when he comes out of his pod."

AS soon as he said it, the last pod started whirring and opened up to reveal the armored warrior. Everyone but Tea, Tristan, and Mokuba stood up and waled over to greet the mystery fighter. Joey came up in front. He says, "Man, what you did back there was awesome. You're really good for a beginner. Who are you?"

The armored warrior didn't say a word, but instead reaches for the helmet with both hands, or a hand and a cannon, and removes it slowly. As he does, long, ribbon-like locks of blonde hair started to dangle out of the red headwear. As he moves the helmet up higher, more locks of hair falls out, making the observers exclaim.

The person completely takes the helmet off, revealing a beautiful, female face with purple eyes and cherry-red lips. Everyone gasped. Joey was especially shocked, "Mai?"

* * *

><p>Everyone stood on top of building. The virtually sun begins to set. The sky turned into a stunning orange. Mokuba did also mentioned that the time in Smash City would be realistically the same.<p>

"So," Yugi says to Mai, "Mokuba sent you a virtual helmet, too?"

The blonde woman nodded, "He asked if I would test out the helmets, too. He told me that the rest of you are doing it, and I didn't have anything better to do anyway, so I-"

"You decided to hang out wit us again even after we haven't herad from ya for a while, huh?"

Everyone looked at Joey, "What? It's just that we haven't talked much since we saved you from the Orichalcos. I'm just saying."

"Still the same old mouthy kid, huh, Wheeler? Come on, I know I haven't been hanging out with you guys anymore, but I needed some alone time, you know, after ending up as a stone portrait? And beside, me, Yugi and Tea met again last night at the new mall, right, guys?"

"Yeah, we sure did," answered Yugi.

"Totally," nodded Tea.

"And also, when Mokuba offered me a helmet, I did _a lot _of thinking, about testing out for KaibaCorp again, and about hanging out with you guys again. The reasons I said yes was _maybe _we could be pals again."

Everyone started to give exchange looks.

"And the other reason is, you owe me a challenge, Joey."

"What?" the confused, male blonde said. He and the others looks at Mai, who does an inside chuckle.

Unbeknownst to them, a pile of Shadow Bugs started to form 50 feet away from them. This pile has red eyes, staring at all those fighters. After a moment, it disappears.

* * *

><p><strong>Enemies:<strong>

**(7) - Glunder: If someone gets to close to one, they'll stand still, open up, and let loose with a flash of electricity.**

**(8) - Jyk: Six-spiked enemies that are immune to all attacks. They either stay in one place or moves in a predetermined path.**

**(9) - Roturret: It rotates from its center and shoots at the player. It spins around and loses its aim if it is attacked.**

**Items:**

**[10] - Star Rod: A combination of a melee clobbering weapon and a shooting weapon. It's known for breaking many of the standard rules of reflecting items.**

**[11] - Cracker Launcher: Allows the player to rapidly launch firecrackers, which bounce off walls and explode on impact with a floor or enemy.**


	16. Chapter 16

**(AN: Sorry if the end of the last chapter seemed kinda rushed. I've been trying to finish it before the end of last month. Hopefully it won't happen again. Also, if you don't think that last chapter was rushed, great.)**

The school bell rung. Dozens of students walked out all of the doors across the hallway, excited to go home for the day.

Everyone except Yugi and Joey left the classroom. Yugi is stacking up his homework on his desk, and Joey is putting his stuff in his bag.

Yugi watches the blonde put his bag's strap around his shoulder. "You're getting ready to go to work, Joey?" he asked.

"Yep. Goin' home ta change into my chef uniform."

He nodded, "Cool." Yugi is really happy for his friend. Ever since he heard his job at the fancy restaurant, he was actually quite surprised. He never thought that he would make a great cook. He always knew that he would have made a great duelist. He's also surprised that the people at a restaurant so fancy would hire a high school student and pay him some big bucks.

"So, what're _you _up to after school?"

"Well, nothing much. I have a ton of homework I need to work on tonight."

"You gonna play on yer helmet when you have time?"

"Nah. I'm taking a break from that. Besides, I have so much homework, it'll probably be my bedtime by the time I finish all of them."

"Yeah, good point. Well, anyway, see ya," said Joey as he's about to walk out of the classroom.

"Uh, hey, Joey?" Joey stops and turned to the shorter boy, "Would you like to come to the Egyptian festival with me, Grandpa, and the Hawkins next week?"

Joey raises an eyebrow, "An Egyptian festival?"

"Yeah. At the museum. They decided to have one every year, starting this year. It's a lot more fun than it sounds. They'll food, parties, games, and duels."

The objective he said made Joey smile, "There's gonna be dueling, huh? Well you can count me in," he said as he points his free thumb back at him. The mention of food and games was already enough to interest him. Being a good chef is one thing, but Duel Monsters is his specialty.

"Great," said Yugi. "The festival starts next Saturday, at 8:00 AM."

"Ok. I'll tell the others about it later. Maybe they might come too."

"Cool. And if Mai comes, maybe you and her can have that rematch there."

The blonde teen's happy expression fell, "Uh, what?"

"Remember? She wants a rematch after that last duel you had with her."

"Yuge, she was possessed by the Orichalcos."

"Yeah, but-"

Joey's irritated sigh interrupts him, "I gotta go. See ya tomorrow." He finally head for the room's exit.

"Uh, yeah, ok. Later."

Joey walks out of the room and strolls through the hallway, morphing with the other students in the hall.

While walking, what Yugi just said made him think about what Mai had told him the other day.

**(Flashback)**

_Joey and Mai stands on the building in Smash City alone. Everyone else had logged out back to the real world. Orange rays of sunset light emanates from the artificial sun, their shadows mirrored their positions from their other sides from the sun._

_Joey was the first to speak, "So, this is about da duel we had last tome right?"_

_"Maybe," the female blonde replied._

_"An' you think dis is a good time ta tell me about it?"_

_She blinked confusedly, "What do you mean, Joey?"_

_"I mean... don't ya think it's kinda sudden? Askin' me about a rematch after we've just met after in months? We barely even seen each other since." __Mai only gave a neutral look, showing no emotions at all. "Is dat why you agreed to test out one of da helmets when Mokuba asked you?"_

_The older girl said nothing for a moment, but then she gives a deep breath, and said, "Joey... I've been doing a lot of thing these last months, about when should I tell you that I want a rematch." She turns away from Joey, until her back faces him. "But I guess you're right, it was a bit too soon to ask..." __Joey gives a concerned look. She lifts up her right wrist, "I'll see you later, Joey." A Data Band forms around her body armor wrist. The holographic menu screen projected above the semi-sphere projector. She presses the down arrow to scroll all the way down to the "Log Out" option. Before she selects it, a surprise hand grabbed her shoulder._

_"Wait." Joey has his hand on her shoulder without even thinking, causing Mai to stop what she was doing. Joey tries find some right words to say. Knowing him, finding the right words would be like finding a needle in a haystack, or in his case, a word in his brain. Fortunately, he knows how to respond, "Look, Mai, I see why you want a rematch, but... c'mon. You were possessed by da Orichalcos for cryin' out loud. An' besides, you're da one who technically won dat duel."_

_Joey can never forget the last time they dueled. Mai managed to defeat him, but she was et free afterwards. She tried to keep Joey from being the next victim to the Orichalcos, but it was too late. Mai regretted ever letting that happen to him, considering that he was the main one who cares about her. Joey could now tell why she wants to duel him again, to make up for everything that has happened in the past._

_Joey takes a deep breath, "Look, Mai, I know you wanna make up for what had happened... but if you want a rematch bad enough to get over your mistakes, I-" he sighed deeply before saying something else, "When you wanna duel?" _

_Mai didn't answer for a moment. "I didn't think exactly plan when we duel."_

_Joey blinked._

_"When Mokuba asked me to be one of his helmet testers two nights ago, he told me that you guys are thinking about testing them out too. I thought about it for a minute and then I told him I'll try it out sometime. He gave me a call yesterday and went over the details about how everything works, like how to enter this city and find Smash Tower for example. When I finally first arrived here today, I only saw Tea, Tristan, and Mokuba in the rec room." Her talking becomes more and more faster by every second. "They needed a fourth player for the Adventure Mode and Mokuba went over the details about how that works. And when I first enter that cloud area and kicked that turret robot's butt with no problem, and then when I told that I want a challenge, I don't know, it kinda slipped out. I knew I (Um, Mai?) should've let this develop, but the excitement of this game just made (Mai.) me say things without even thinking right. Look, if you don't want a rematch, then I suppose that's your choice, but-"_

_"Mai!" _

_Joey grabbed both her shoulders, forcing Mai to stop as her eyes widened._

_"I think I get the point. You wanna make it up to make for havin' my taken away when we last dueled, an' after all the nice things I would've done for ya. I understand, Mai. An' don't worry about da game makin' ya too excited, we've all been there. I just want you know dat I except yer challenge, so you won't have ta worry about what happened afterwards. I just want you ta stop worrying about the past, if dueling again is the only way, then I'll be more than happy to duel you. Just tell when and where, and I'm there! So whadya say?"_

_Mai had her eyes pointing at Joey the whole time. She didn't say anything for a moment, but then she closes her eyes and smiled. She turns back at the taller blonde and answered, "Okay, Joey. I'll let you know when we can have our little rematch. But for now, I'd suggest you worry about school, okay?"_

_Without hesitation, Joey nodded, "You bet, Mai. I'll still be ready when you're ready. Just name your time and place and I'm there!"_

_"Good, 'cause I'll be more than happy to kick your blonde butt into next week with my beloved Harpies, Wheeler."_

_The male blonde smirked, "Still as egotistic as ever, huh? Even from what we've been through, you still haven't changed a bit."_

_Mai gave out a laugh._

* * *

><p>Joey had told Yugi about Mai's request earlier today. He did wonder why Mai decided to test one of the virtual helmets out, and why she decided to have a rematch with him when it was so sudden. He figured maybe she doesn't want to be so lonely anymore. Before they met, she was always by herself. She never did have many friends. If she was going to challenge him again, he expected her to be a little more serious at first. He is happy to accept it so she forget about what happened.<p>

Thoughts and ides race across his mind as he continues to walk through the hallway. He and many other students migrate through the halls as he trots his way to home before going to work.

**(Not really my best chapter, and definitely not what I'd call worth the wait, considering that I haven't updated for over 20 days. I just started school this week. I wanted to write more in this chapter, but I'd rather just update it and get it over with. I'll still edit this chapter if I need to sometime. Hopefully I'll update next chapter a little bit sooner than this one. Bye!)**


	17. Chapter 17

**(Ok, I know I said I would try to post this chapter earlier than last time, but let's be honest here; I've had ****school since last month, and I've**** been real busy. Not only it takes away my energy to keep writing, but I'm more likely to get writer's block, regardless. I won't make anymore promises, I'll work on this story during my own time. Anyway, here's Chapter 17, and stay tuned for next chapter. I think you're gonna like this one. Enjoy!"**

The restaurant was dimly lit, silently crowded with tables of men and woman in fancy garments as they help themselves with magnificent cuisines. Music played by a small orchestral band comforts the atmosphere with their soothing melodies.

The walls were decorated with real 16th century-styled weaponry, swords, tridents, you name it. They also feature knight armory and statues mounted against almost all if the walls and corner, giving the restaurant a château touch.

A transparent, glass floor in the middle of the large building shows a large aquarium full of big, exotic fish swimming about. They each could be found from a different part of the world.

Joey walked in through the back door, in his chef outfit. He looks around the room. The kitchen he entered was bright. Long rows of counters/stoves/machines align inside the place. The scent of grease and spices and the sounds of machinery fills the air. Joey could smell and hear them before he even walked in. The chefs prepare the dishes while others work the machines. Sometimes, it felt like a factory to him, and he and the chefs are the machines themselves. There are at least a dozen of chefs in this big kitchen.

Joey sighed before fixing up his chef hat. "Well, time for another evenin' at work," he said to himself as he stops fixing his hat and walks through the kitchen.

As he trots through between two rows, he looks from left to right as he passes by each chef. The first one he passes on his right is chopping up a live fish with machete. Another chef on his left is stirring boiling stew in a crock pot. The orange-ish liquid randomly exploded out of the pot and covered his entire face. Joey winced at the poor guy's misfortunance. As he continue to walk through, he sees containers of ingredients on both counters from his left and right.

He heads towards a wooden cutting board on a chrome counter next to a stove. A cutting knife lays on the board. The blonde teen walks up and stands in front of the chrome counter.

"Okay," he says to himself, where do we-?"

Just then, he heard a bell ringing.

"Hey, Wheeler!"

The blonde looked in front of him to see a man behind a window waving around a small peice of notebook paper. He smiled, "Hey, Vick!" He walks over to the window.

"Good to see you made it," said Vick. "You got a big order with your name on it."

"Big order, huh?" He grabbed the paper from his hand. He takes a look at the paper and then he noticed that his name is written on the top-left corner that says, "Get Joey Wheeler to cook this."

"Hah?" said a confused Joey.

"Didn't think I mean literally, did'ja? Who'd ya think ordered that?"

Letting his pride get the best of him once again, Joey starts giggling to himself. "Probably another fan of mine if they knew that I worked here," he gloated.

Vick smirked, "Your 'fan' must've REALLY loved you enough to make you cook an order big enough for at least two chefs to work on, not to mention that you're probably the only available while everyone is too busy with others, and that you're the only person available to big that order to that customer."

Joey's pride started to deflate after what his co-worker just said. His head dropped down and he looked to the floor in agony. "Aw, man," he complained. Vick feels bad, but he still couldn't help but laugh.

* * *

><p>Joey walked out of the kitchen and into the large dining area, pushing a chrome cart with three dishes in the bottom and two at the top. As miserable as he is, cooking five different dishes all by himself within 45 minutes, he does enjoy looking around this marvelous restaurant. The calm atmosphere, the even calmer music playing right now, the smell of other gourmet foods. Joey takes a deep whiff and exhales in satisfaction. "Workin' as a chef may be a pain in da neck, but da restaurant itself is just awesome!"<p>

He walks over the transparent, glass floor with the aquarium under it. Joey always loved to walk over the aquarium, seeing all the exotic fish under there. He thought maybe someday, if he makes enough money, he could invite Serenity and the others to eat here.

Now he starts to thinks, "Okay, now let's see. Vick told me this order goes to table 15. Hmm, wonder who table 15 is, and how'd they know that I work here now." He then smiles while chuckling to himself, "Probably one of my biggest fans. 'Guess when it comes to bein' a famous duelist, I suppose it makes sense for them to spy on their favorite idol." He starts to fantasize, "Maybe it's some rich kids, or some cute fangirls, or maybe-"

"Well, it took you long enough, Wheeler."

A male voice made him stop fantasizing. The voice that called out his last name sounded familiar, and not in a good way. His happiness deflated eventually as he once again whined, "Don't tell me..."

A crowd of customers in fancy clothing travel by in front of him. When they cleared, he spots Mokuba sitting in a table with a familiar, brown-haired jerk, both wearing fancy, white suits. They both look at the blonde chef.

"Hey, Joey!" greeted Mokuba.

"Hey, Mokuba," Joey greeted nicely to Mokuba before glaring at the other male. "Kaiba," he growled.

The older man just sat there with a smirk on his face, with arms crossed. "Well if it isn't my server of today. Who knew I'd get a trained monkey to cook and deliver a big meal for us."

"Say what!? You ordered all of this? How'dju even know I work here?"

"Well," Mokuba started, "I called your house this morning but your sister Serenity answered instead. I asked her if you would wanna try out a new arcade in the game, but she said you already left for school. She told me that you're also going to dress up for work after school. She told me you work in this new restaurant and then I told Seto, and-"

"And then I decided that we should check this place out tonight," Seto finished. "And since we're here, what better way to enjoy our meals here for the first time then to have _you_ cook whatever we want? Imagine: Joey Wheeler being both a lame duelist and an even lamer chef."

Steam starts coming out of Joeys ears as his face becomes crimson. He would've yelled, but the last thing he needs is to lose his job for threatening to have the KaibaCorp president "seeing stars". Instead, he responds softly, "I'll have ya know that I can cook just as well as I can play Duel Monsters, Kaiba. And thanks to dis job, dis 'lame cook' managed to afford livin' in a cool house in a cool neighborhood."

The brunet huffed, "Whatever. So, you gonna bring our food up, or what, Monkey Boy?"

Steam starts to come out again, this time through his nose _and_ ears. _Sometimes, just this once, I would just clobber dis loser to a pulp, _he thought.

**(See you guys next time!)**


	18. Chapter 18

Yugi is in his room. He starts snoring as he had his head laying on his desk. His desk lamp was left on, lighting up the darkened room. The day had turned to night. His head is laying on top of his homework. Two to three hours of non-stop homework and know supper was enough to knock the boy out.

His white house phone started to ring. He groaned softly as he slowly raised his head up. A trail of drool ran down his chin. He rubs the sleep out of his right eye with his fist. A bit groggery, he reaches his phone, which was on the edge of his desk.

He picks up the large device and answered with a tired voice, "Hello?"

**"Hey, Yugi,"** the voice sounded like Mokuba's. **"How you doing?"**

Yugi yawned, "Hey, Mokuba. I'm doing just fine. Getting some homework done."

**"That's good. Say, maybe if you have time, would you like to join at me at Smash City? M****aybe**** tomorrow, after school? Everyone else said they have no plans or homework after school tomorrow, so they're thinking about it."**

"I don't know if _I_ have plans or homework for tomorrow, Mokuba."

**"Well, I don't mean like for battling, Adventure Mode, crazy racing, or anything like that. I just wanna hang out, that's all."**

"Hang out, huh? Hmm, I guess I might have time for a little chat."

**"Great! See you tomorrow!"**

"Okay," Yugi hangs up the phone and looks back at his homework.

* * *

><p>Inside the virtual world, the battleship Halberd across the reddish, cloudy sea. Its rabid speed cause immensely loud <strong><span><em>WHOOSHING<em>!** sounds as its bat-like wings cuts through the air.

Spawn aboard the flying ship is the familiar brunette in her pink dress and the familiar white-hair boy in his combat outfit. They stand tall aboard Halberd, strong winds blowing in their squinting-eyed faces, making their hair blow rapidly backwards.

"Uh, are we on the Halberd?" Tea asked.

"Uhh, I think we are," Bakura answered, looking around.

The brunette raises her hand above her forehead, "I don't get it; what are we supposed to do up here, get inside this thing and hijack the mother board?"

**"Nah, that would probably be too easy,"** said Joey's voice over the intercom.

Bakura starts to think, "Hmm, let's try moving forward. Maybe we'll find a door, or something."

**"Hmph, good luck with that," **said Joey again, doubting that could happen.

* * *

><p>Yugi materialized on top of a roof in Smash City, the same rooftop where they last meet here to be specific. He once again appears in his jajoon attire. His upper body is once more covered by his striped shirt, along with his lower body wrapped in his short jeans. He looked around the area. The current sky is lightly tinted with orange, indicating that sunset is getting close, just like their current timeline in the real world.<p>

He smiled, feeling happy to come back here again after a long day, stressful day at school.

"Hey, Yugi!"

He looked ahead and saw Mokuba on the edge of the roof, waving his hand while looking back at him. Yugi smiled and walked towards the other boy. "Hey, Mokuba." As he walks to Mokuba, a clump of Shadow Bugs slowly begin to form.

As Yugi sat next to the other boy on the edge, with his upper body supported by his arms behind his back, Mokuba started to speak, "I was worried you wouldn't make it. How's it going?"

"I'm doing fine. School has been stressful lately, but coming here definitely helps make my day better."

Mokuba nods, "That's great."

Unbeknownst to the boys, the clump of Shadow Bugs grew slowly meters away from behind them.

"So, you guys are still interested in coming to the festival this Saturday?"

"Well, I dunno about Seto," he shrugs, "but I think I still might be able to go."

"Great. Where are the others?"

"They're in the tower, trying to conquer another Story Mode mission."

"Oh. What level are they at now?"

* * *

><p>"Uh, how did we end up here?" asked a slightly confused 'Princess" Tea as she and Bakura somehow materialized from the battleship Halberd to an area much similar to the one in Skyworld. Tea crosses her arms over her chest, "Is it just me, or is this mode starting to get weirder already?"<p>

"Well, it's certainly starting to get more heavy with fighting," said Bakura as he points to a group of Primids running up the hill that they're on.

"Oh, man," Tea complained before immediately gaining confidence. She looks at the white-haired boy, "Ready to take them on?" Bakura nodded in response. He pulls out a different-looking lazar gun out of his holster. His gun is black, and it has a curve blade attached to the bottom of the firing hole. Tea and Bakura looks back at enemies. With Tea's pink parasol and Bakura's laser gun ready, they began to charge.

* * *

><p>"So, how's <em>your<em> day going?"

"Good," said Mokuba. "Even though Seto's educators' been giving me way too much homework."

Yugi blinked, "Educators?"

"Oh, right! "I've never told you guys. Seto hired some top educators for me. He figured maybe when he retires someday, _I_ could be the next KaibaCorp president."

Yugi kind of expected that, but he still seems surprised about this, "Huh. You think you can handle that responsibility?"

"Well... I'm not exactly sure if I want to be the next Kaiba for the job." Mokuba has a hint of sadness in his voice.

Yugi frowned a little, "How come?"

Mokuba looks down with eyes full of somber. He brings his knees close to his chin as he wraps his arms around his legs.

* * *

><p>Tea and Bakura ended up in an area with cloud for a ceiling, similar to the one Tea crossed at the last level. "That was the second time I've encountered those electric wheel thingies, and already I'm getting sick and tired of them," complained said brunette. The "electric wheel thingies" she mentioned were the multiple Glunders that she and Bakura were constantly being electrocuted by back there. Tea faced Bakura, "Let's just hope we don't get shocked by any of those annoying things ever again." Bakura nodded in agreement.<p>

Just then, an orange tentacle wiggle towards Tea and made contact with her back. Tea does some weird, hyperactive movements as purple electricity surrounded her body.

"Tea!" Bakura cried out as she fell down. When she did, the white-haired teen was shocked **(no pun intended. Well, sorta)** to see a strange, floating fish**(10)** that was behind Tea, who is now twitching on the floor from yet another embarrassing shock. This fish has orange scale, the only thing on its face is a giant, purple eyeball. Finally, it has orange tendrils hanging from its belly.

With seriousness forming in his eyes, Bakura pulls out his dark laser gun out of his holster and starts shooting at the fish monster with a green, spiky ball of energy. It took two more shots before the fish-like creature was blasted away. Bakura uses his free hand to help Tea up. "Are you alright?" he asked.

"I think so," the girl responded weakly, establishing that maybe you can feel some pain in this virtual world. Of course, she had that experienced back at Noah's digital dungeon.

**"**Man, and I thought da fish in the aquarium at my job looked kinda freaky," said Joey, sitting on the big couch back at the tower with Serenity.

"The screen said that the weird fish that attacked you is called a Feyesh," stated the redhead, looking at the two fighters in the TV screen with her brother.

"Thanks for the info, Serenity," said Tea, starting to feel better, now.

"Hey, what's that?" asked Bakura, pointing at what's behind her. Tea turned around to see a giant, ram-like creature**(11)** sleeping in the bigger area, with bubbles coming out of its nose.

**"Woah! It looks like one of my Scapegoat Tokens, but HUGE!"** said Joey, over the intercom.

**"Aww, it looks so cute when it's sleeping!"** Serenity awed.

Tea walks up to the sleeping animal. Her snow-haired partner started to worry, "Tea, what are you doing?!"

"Calm don't Bakura. It's asleep. What's so dangerous about an adorable sheep taking a nap?" As she walks up to the ram monster, Tea places a hand on its forehead. Suddenly, the new creature opened its black eyes. Then, those black eyes turned demonic green while its white skin turned into a raging bright red. It opened its mouth, baring claw-sharp teeth, and made a terrifying roar. Dark electricity surged around its body.

Tea's eyes became circles as she screams of fright. Joey cried and Serenity gasped.

"Tea!" Before Bakura could do anything, the demonic goat rammed Tea, knocking her out of the area. Bakura yelled, "Oh, no!" Next, the monster started to charge at him, forcing the teen to run away.

And that, kids, is why you should **never** pet any strange, sleeping animal, especially if it's a innocent-looking sheep that has a demonic tantrum who really needs to get some sleep.

* * *

><p>"You see, Yugi," Mokuba starts to explain his part, with his knees close to his mouth, "back then, my brother was a kind person, always smiling, always happy..."<p>

"I think you told us that before, Mokuba," said Yugi.

"Yeah. Well anyway, when Gozaburo adopted us, he made Seto go through so much work. He needed someone to run KaibaCorp, but they have to be toughened up in order to get the job. They pushed my brother to his limits for a long time. They even treated him like garbage." Yugi started to feel sorrow for his brother. "See, if you're gonna run a company like KaibaCorp, not only you have to be tough, but you also have to be a big jerk, and thanks to all of Gozaburo's harsh mentoring, that's exactly what Seto's become," Mokuba closes his eyes, "and since I'm the only Kaiba left right now, he probably wants me to be exactly like him."

Yugi already understood how Mokuba feels. As much as an insensitive jerk Kaiba was, he and Mokuba would always love each other, as a family. "So that's why you don't feel you should run the company?"

"Mmm-hm," he nodded.

"Have you talked to your brother about what you think?"

Mokuba opens his eyes back up, "Well, no. But I'm thinking about it. I mean, I don't wanna grow up to be a complete jerk. I like you guys, I'm a people person."

"Well, you know, if he wanted someone to take his place, he could find a girl to marry and- well, you know."

Mokuba's sad frown turned into a lightened-up chuckle. He looks back at Yugi, "I don't think I wanna be an uncle too soon, either, Yugi."

Yugi chuckled back, "Well, either way, it seems we both could take a break from all our stresses. Hanging out in this virtual land would definitely be a good example."

Mokuba frowned again and looked back at his knees, "Yeah, about that..."

Yug's smiled dropped as he looks at the other boy.

_I know Yugi's trying to stop feeling stressed out, _Mokuba thought, _but I'll have to tell them eventually. I know now wouldn't be a good time, but..._

"Mokuba?"

Mokubadidn't respond for a moment, until, "... I've been meaning to tell you guys..."

"Huh?"

Mokuba starts, "You see, the-" Mokuba was interrupted by a strange sound, Yugi heard the sound too. They looked behind him to see a giant pile of Shadow Bugs forming. They both got up.

"Shadow Bugs?!" Yugi exclaimed looking up at the big pile of dark fuzz. "They're supposed to be in the TV back at Smash Tower! What's it doing _here_? And **_how_** did it get here?!"

"I should've guessed something like this would break loose...," said Mokuba, with nothing but worry in his digitized mind.

**Enemies:**

**(10) - Feyesh: These fish-like creatures shock their opponents with their electric anemone-like tentacles.**

**(11) - Towtow: They get mad quickly if awakened, and they're very powerful when they charge at you.**

**(And that should do it for this chapter. I thought about writing more, but I'd rather call it here. I'd like to point out that it's been exactly one year since I've joined Fanfiction as an author, November 22nd. Since Thanksgiving Break is coming, hopefully I'll use that time to work on the next chapter and read some stories I'm following. Man, I have a lot of catching up to do here. Anyways, see you guys next time! P.S., anyone excited for SSB4? "Cause I am! :) Bye!)**


	19. Chapter 19

Bakura appeared at another different area with Duke, who was Tea's replacement after she was just K.O.'d by that rampaging ram creature. They stood on another brown, brick platform, slightly sloped. The area they arrived at seems to be all the way down to the earth. Duke spotted some mountain ranges to his left. Bakura can see some flat, cloud platforms floating up ahead. The white-haired boy turns to the raven-haired boy, "Hey, thanks for rescuing me from that horrible beast, Duke."

"Yeah, no problem," Duke responded as he turned his head to the other teen. "I'm guessing we're not up in the clouds anymore."

**"Yeah, it looks like you two warped to the earth ground, or somethin'," **said Joey, over the intercom.

Out of nowhere, something hit Duke in the face. "Hey!" he exclaimed as he spotted a small, black creature wearing a pair of red, stretched trousers full of presents and candies**(12)** wandering around in front of them.

Bakura bent down and picked up a small white box with red ribbons, the object that whacked Duke's face. "Here's the culprit to what hit you," said Bakura as Duke examined the box as well.

"Hmph, some present," huffed Duke before another box hit him in the face. "Hey!"

Frightened, the little "treat" giver ran down the slope away from the teenagers, leaving a trail of goodies that fell out of its pants. As it ran, a swarm of Spaak came approaching them. Duke and Bakura pulled out their lazar guns, but the realize that it may be proven difficult, because they're all charging up their electric attacks all at once. Feeling a bit too vulnerable to their attacks, Bakura grabbed Duke's free hand with his own and dashed ahead tight under the cloud-like monsters. The Spaak launched their attacks, they shoot lightning at the two while others shoot purple, electric orbs. Duke and Bakura dodged each attack as they continued running, ignoring the cloud platforms above them, and the goodies below them. They eventually jumped down a big gap.

It was quite a drop, but as Mokuba said, you don't taking damage from plummeting. They land down the entrance of what seems to be a cavern. There was a flash of light. All the Spaak disappeared, but something else appeared on top of an edge of the wall in front of them, small, black portal, much like the color of the void that absorbed the Midair Stadium. The portal started to spawn little yellow, 2-dimensional creatures with arms, legs, and stick-figure physiques**(13)**. The two teens looked up as the portal spawned more of these tiny creatures.

Bakura was the first to ask, "What are _those?_"

**"According to the screen,"** answered Tea's voice, **"t****hose yellow things are called Mites."**

"there's so many of them," said Bakura with a worried voice.

Duke, however, is not so intimidated. "Oh, please. We're like ten times their size. What harm can they do." One of the Mites lunged down and deliveder a swinging, midair kick to the raven-haired dude's face. Bakura exclaimed as he watched his teammate being launched into the cave, almost touching a barrier blocking the way.

"Duke, are alright?"

The sound of Duke's voice was slow and weak, "I stand corrected."

* * *

><p>Yugi and Mokuba watched as the pile of Shadow Bugs in front of them started to grow bigger. The towering about four times their size now. Finally, the Shadow Bugs stopped growing and started to change. The dark fuzz started to shed, leaving nothing but a giant Primid<strong>(14) <strong>in its place.

Yugi and Mokuba gasped.

"It's a Primid!" yelled Mokuba.

"But it's huge!" said Yugi.

As the Shadow Bugs finally disintegrated, all there's left is the big Primid, staring down at his little targets.

The two boys tries to take a step back. The heel of one's foot inched off the edge of the roof. They both turned their heads and looked down at the thirty foot drop down a street from up the roof. They quickly realized that they're completely cornered, but maybe not as Yugi though of something.

"Mokuba, remember what you said about not taking damage from falling?"

Mokuba was mostly too busy staring up at the situation in slight fright (and by "situation, I mean the large Primid that looks like it's about to pummel them until they're as flat as Duel Monsters cards), but he answered, "Yeah, but that's for when you play Adventure Mode or play matches."

"Well, what if it applies _here_, in Smash City?"

The young boy looks at the other, "What are trying at?"

"I'm saying that, maybe if we could jus hop off this roof, we-" Yugi was abruptly interrupted when something blue and illuminated sliced between him and the other boy, a giant Beam Sword, wielded by the big Primid. The giant soldier withdrew its sword, leaving a deep, linear cut between Yugi and Mokuba. They watched in shock as the big Primid wields its Beam Sword. The sword is much bigger than the sword that Duke and the regular-sized Primids used back in Midair Stadium. This one is big enough for the big Primid.

"Woah," Yugi cried, "Where did that sword come from?!"

"I don't know!"

They both gasped again as the big Primid holds up the blue light sword over it right shoulder and prepares to swing, but before it could, a big, purple ball of energy collided with it.

The momentum made monster's sword fling out of its hand. The soldier fell to the ground, creating a small tremor. Seconds later, the sword that flew out of its hand fell from the air, and the illuminated blade stabbed through the roof showing only a quarter of the blade and the handle.

The two boys stared in awestruck before they heard a familiar female voice, "You two okay?" They looked to their right and spotted the smack-talking blonde woman in her orange, metal suit, aiming her green arm cannon at the large Primid.

Yugi was the first to respond, "Mai!"

"Boy, are we glad you showed up," thanked Mokuba gratefully.

"Hm," the blonde girl grinned, thinking what they could possibly do without her. Suddenly, she gasped as the big Primd slowly picked itself up. The sound of crumbling concrete made Yugi and Mokuba whip their heads towards the giant. As the creature got up, it left a Primid-shaped imprint on the roof floor.

Yugi turned his head to the other boy, "One of us has to go to Smash Tower and get the others! This could be an error or a virus!"

Mokuba nodded, "Right, I'll go! You and Mai take care of him!" With that, Mokuba encased himself in fire and blasted off like a rocket, towards the Tower.

Yugi nodded back as the boy took off. He wasn't so surprised that he could do that, but he did forget that special attacks in the city heightens, which makes him wonder if he could take down the giant Primid with ease. Or maybe the city can strengthen enemies, too?

Mai ran next to Yugi and aims her arm cannon at the enemy. "Why don't we teach this thing a lesson, Yugi?" she said, confident that they can take out the Primid before Mokuba could even step foot in the tower to get the others. Surprisingly, Yugi isn't so confident, but he nodded as he holds up two fingers, closed to each other, with sparks and flames dancing around them. They both prepares themselves as they face the standing-again monster, which is looking forward to crush its two smashers.

* * *

><p>Three out of four of the cylindrical pods rose up from the floor in the rec room. They opened up, each revealing a fighter who took on Level 3 and conquered it, excluding Tea and Tristan. Tea was a bit disappointed that she was the only one who was knocked out early. But not as disappointed as Tristan, he never got to explore the second cloud area at all, he was in the waiting stock the whole time.<p>

Bakura, Duke, and Tristan all came out of their pods, all but one feeling great about finishing another awesome mission. Tea and the Wheeler siblings sat on the three-man couch in front of the coffee table, Serenity sat in the middle.

"Congratulations on the latest completion, you guys," Serenity cheered.

"Why thanks, Serenity," said the black-haired boy. "And what can I say? Not only I was born beautiful and ready for anything, but lucky, too."

Tristan rolled his eyes, with his arms crossed, "You mean lucky enough_ not_ to be annihilated by those two Greaps at the end?"

Duke rolls his eyes to the brunet at his left, "No, lucky enough _not _to have some amateur soldier cramping my style." He then smirked.

The angered teen faced the green-eyed one. Steam came out of his nose, "Yeah, well you won't be lucky when I'm finished with you, pretty boy!"

Duke turns his face at the other's, "Oh, yeah?"

"Yeah!"

"Oh, come on, you guys, no need to make a fuss," Bakura waves his hands in plea.

Tea sweat-drops as she face-palms and groaned, "They're never going to get along, are they?"

"Hmph, same with me an' Kaiba," said Joey, with his arms and legs crossed.

Serenity looks at her brother, "Hey, Joey, you think I can be in the next level?"

The blonde's eyes widened. He looked back at his red-haired relative, feeling uncomfortable with his sister's request, "Uhhh."

The glass elevator in the middle of the room rose up. As it opened up, Mokuba stepped out. "Guys!" he exclaimed. Everyone, even the bickering Serenity fanboys, all turned there heads towards the young boy.

"Hey, Mokuba," Bakura spoke, "we just completed the Sea of Clouds. What do you say we-"

"You guys have to come with me," Mokuba interrupted. "Yugi and Mai are in trouble!"

There was instinctive replies throughout the room. Joey quickly rose up from his seat when the word "trouble" was said. "What kind of trouble?"

* * *

><p>"PK Fire!" Yugi shot a lightning bolt from his fingers. The Primid dodged the bolt effortlessly while it walked backwards to its sword.<p>

Mai jumped in front of the boy and shot three missiles from her arm cannon. The overgrown soldier turned and pulled its Beam Sword out of the rooftop floor. In the nick of time, it turned back around and swung the blue light saber around. The purple-tipped missiles blew up as they made contact with the large sword.

Mai lowered her cannon and watched in shock, "Oh, no. It didn't work."

The Primid charged at its two enemies, with its Beam Sword ready for striking. Mai turned around, held Yugi into her arms, and leapt out of the way before the monster slices them with its illuminated blade.

Mai and Yugi landed a few meters away from the enemy, who pulled its sword out again, leaving a cut mark on the roof when it buried the blade into it.

The two looked back at the monster before looking at each other. Mai says something first, "Any idea how that overgrown soldier got here? I thought no enemy is supposed to be outside of the Story Mode."

"I have no idea," Yugi shook his spiky head, "but I have a feeling that we're not just here to test the helmets. Something's not right, I think Kaiba and Pegasus are up to something, but what?"

"You got me, kiddo. But even though they're a couple of no-good jerks, I don't think they'd go low enough to put our lives in danger."

"Well, there is that one time that Pegasus trapped my Grandpa's soul inside a card, the time that Kaiba blew up Kaiba Island and we were almost in the explosion, and the one time that Kaiba nearly wiped our souls out with Critias while we were under the spell of the Orichalcos during his and the Pharaoh's duel against Dartz."

The blonde female sweat-dropped, "Oh, yeah. I forgot about all of that."

Yugi looked up above Mai's head. "Mai! Look out!"

"Uh?" She turned around to see the large Primid raise it Beam Sword up in the air. Before it could strike again, a small, yellow boomerang soared above the Smash City buildings and eventually struck its wrist, and made it drop its weapon once again. They watched as the boomerang landed right next to the giant sword, making a rapid, dropped-coin effect before stopping completely.

_Isn't that Joey's boomerang?_ Yugi thought, No... his boomerang looks different, _and it creates a tornado around it when thrown._

Next, a figure leapt out of nowhere high up in the air. It wears a stocking cap and a tunic like Joey. It has a sword in one hand and has a shield strapped around the other. Yugi and Mai noticed the figure and automatically assumed it was Joey, but something about that figure seems rather different. Without warning, the figure zoomed straight down and slits through the giant soldier's arm with the sword. Shadow Bugs bled from the wound in the arm like blood.

Yugi and Mai yelled in amazement before turning to the figure that landed behind the big Primid. As smoke cleared out, the figure has been revealed; it was a person wearing the same green attire as Joey, but this one is a lighter green and a bit less detailed. The shield is different, as well; it's brown instead of blue and it has silver markings all over it, and has a Triforce symbol on the middle. The sword the person carries is the exact same as Joey's, but a bit smaller. Finally the person has long, thick, white hair, almost waist length. Not only that the hair is a dead giveaway of who this person is but the slightly goofy voice as well.

"Well, we meet again, Yugi-boy."

The person turned around, it was a man with slightly tanned skin and has a lock of his hair blocks his left eye; Maximilian Pegasus.

"Pegasus," Yugi spoke his name.

"And speak of the first devil," Mai remarked.

"Pleasure to see you too, Mai", greeted Pegasus, "I see you're both enjoying the game that me and Kaiba-boy created."

"Well, they we were, until that giant _error_ over there showed up and attacked Yugi and Mokuba."

The "giant error", as Mai described it, is still standing. Its "wound" sealed up. Finally, its health bar appeared above its head. It was cut in half, indicating that the huge Primid is halfway defeated.

"Yugi! Mai!"

The two fighters the voice called out for turned their faces towards Joey, who is coming out through the roof door, along with Mokuba and everybody else.

Mai smiled, "It's about time you guys showed up."

Serenity gasped at the size of the Primid in front of them, "Woah! That really is a huge Primid!"

"I never knew there'd be Primids_ that_ big," said Tea.

"That big Primid isn't supposed to be here," explained Mokuba, "We gotta get rid of it before it wrecks up any other part of the city."

When everybody else came into view, they noticed that Pegasus is here. Glancing up and down at his attire, Mokuba spoke first, "Pegasus? Who are _you_ supposed to be?"

Joey was dumbfounded at the tall man's similar clothing to his, "You're playing as Link, too?!"

"Not exactly, Joey-boy," answered Pegasus, "I'm Toon Link, the Link from The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker. I picked this character because he has the word 'toon' in his name, and you know how much I _loved_ toons."

"Oh, believe us, we know." Everyone else nodded dryly in agreement.

Tristan stepped up, staring at their large enemy, "Well, anyway, now that we're all here, whadya say we all take this thing out?" Everyone yells out in agreement.

"Huh?" Yugi notices the health bar above the head of the Primid. He thought, _That health bar... It looks like it's been halved. _He thought something and called out to his friends, "Hey, guys! There's a health bar on top of that thing's head! It's been cut in half from all the damage we've dealt to it so far! It's just like in the Adventure Mode! If we all work together, we may be able to take it down quickly!"

"Sounds like a plan, Yuge", agreed Joey with a thumbs up. "Let's do this!"

The giant Primid picked up its sword before turning to face others who were formed as a group. Joey pulls out his bow before withdrawing an arrow. He aims the arrow at the giant's head and shoots. The Primid uses its sword to block the sharp projectile.

Tristan virtually pulls out his grenade launcher while Bakura and Duke pulls out their respective laser guns, Serenity stood between them and in front of Tristan They all take aim.

Duke says to the redhead, "Serenity, stay beside me. I'll protect you."

Tristan began, "No, Serenity, stay behind _me. I'll _protect you, from Duke," he said the last two words under his breath.

_If these two idiots don't leave my sister alone, **they're **gonna need some protection from me, _Joey thought irritably.

The trio of gun wielders shot lasers and heat-seeking missiles at the enemy. The Primid grabs its sword by the handle with both hands and twirls the weapon around like a baton. The missiles and lasers imploded when they made contact with the light saber. As they keep shooting, Mai took the opportunity to charge up her Charge Shot while its distracted. After fully charged, she blasts the big ball of power out of her Arm Cannon. The Primid looked to its right to see the purple ball launching towards it. It stopped spinning its sword and swings it at the Charge Shot. The Charge Shot ricocheted off the Beam Sword and clashed into another building at a random direction. Mai watched as the ball made two big holes through the front to the back of the building, and groaned.

Pegasus pulls out a bow and whips out an arrow. His brown bow is a bit smaller and lighter in color than Joey's darker brown bow, and the tip of his arrow is bigger than a normal arrow. Yugi brings both his hands behind his head, forming flames around his index and middle fingers. Simultaneously, the Industrial Illusions owner lets go of his arrow while the young King of Games flings his fingers forward, releasing another bolt of PK Fire, both projectiles aiming up at the giant soldier. Everyone is hoping that this attack could finish it off, but it didn't.

The Primid ducked, missing both projectiles. The bolt and the arrow arched down and instead aimed at the opposing attackers. Pegasus' arrow landed between Yugi's feet, startling the boy, and Pegasus ducked Yugi's PK Fire. "I know this isn't the real world," spoke the tall man, "but the last thing I need is a virtual, bad hair day!" He looked up to see the giant Primid walking towards him. Before he could react, it raises its sword and swung it down at him. Pegasus raises his shield, hoping it would be strong enough to hold off the attack.

Out of nowhere, Tea slid in fron of the white-haired man and magically whips out her Toad. A blunt force pushed the big Primid away as the sword made contact with the little mushroom-headed boy.

It fell on its bottom, before quickly getting up. THe health bar above its head halved again, it only has a quarter of its health left.

Mokuba smiled, "Ha! The monster's nearly done! Let's keep it up!"

"No problem." Bakura lunged at the Primid and attempts to claw at the big Primid. The Primid turned its head at the white-haired boy and blocked him with its sword. His claw touched lighted blade, the Primid uses it to push the boy back. Bakura landed on Tristan, Duke rushed over.

"You okay?"

Tristan has swirly eyes while Bakura got up just fine, thanks to the brunet for breaking his fall. The brunet answered weakly, "I... think... so..."

"I was talking to Bakura, Sargeant Dumbo."

"Yes, I'm all right," said Bakura before turning to the monster-sized Primid, "but do we do about that giant Primid?"

Tristan slowly stood up, "Yeah, that thing can't take a rest."

_Rest,_ thought Serenity, remember about her character, Jigglypuff's specialty. She gasped, "Everyone, cover your ears!"

Everybody turned looks at the redhead in the pink jumpsuit. Mokuba responds first, "Why, Serenity?"

"Just do it!" Serenity reaches out her hand. A small, black microphone with a green head magically formed around her hand before she grasps it.

Joey asks, "Whadaya plannin', sis?"

"Just do as I say!"

Everyone exchanged looks before covering their ears as told. The big Primid slowly approaches Serenity and the other boys. Serenity moves the green head of the microphone close to her lips. She licks her lips, clears her throat, and starts to sing a beautiful lullaby. Closing her eyes, she fantasized about being in a mystical land of sparkles and bubbles as she starts singing slowly.

**"Jiiiigglyyypuuuf Jigglyyyyyy-yyyypuuff, Jiiiigglyyypuuuf Jigglyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy, Jiiiigglyyyypuuuuff Jigglyyyyy-yyyypuuuf, Jiiiigglyyypuuuuuf Jigglyyyyyyyyyyyyypuuuuuufff..."**

When Serenity opened her eyes, she found the giant Primid on its back, snoozing, with a bubble growing and shrinking from its "nose". Everyone had their eyes closed as well. As they opened them up, they uncovered their ears and discovered the sleeping giant themselves. Its giant Beam Sword was laying right beside it. .

Serenity was shocked, "I can't believe it..." she smiles, "it worked!"

"Aw, man, it did!" Joey gives his sister a thumbs up. "Killer singing, there, sis!"

"Thanks, Joey!" Serenity takes her microphone with both hands, and pulls off the head, revealing a sharp, black tip that looks like a marker. "What me to draw something silly on its face?"

Just then, the gang heard moan. The turned back towards the Primid, it started shaking before rising up. It eventually stood back up on its feet, it picked up its fallen sword as well.

"Oh, come on!" Tristan complained.

"That thing won't give up!" said Mokuba, "This city's giving it more strength than it should, just like it does for us!"

Joey gritted his teeth as he withdrew his Master Sword, "Dat's it! I'm gonna slice dat thing into a billion pieces! No one makes a fool of my sister an' gets away with it!"

"Joey!" Serenity cried out, but he ignored her as he approaches the large enemy.

"Time ta finish dis thing, once and for-" Joey was interrupted when he heard a whoosh from behind. Everyone, even the big Primid, turned to see what made that sound, another figure up in the air. This figure is blue.

**"Falcoooon..." **the figure called out, with a familiar voice. It lunges downward to the Primid as it shouts out another word, **"PAAAAWNCH!" **As the figure reaches the monster, a yellow-gloved fist collided with the Primid's face, a flaming bird formed around the arm. Its health bar above its head dropped to nothing.

Finally, the Primid's body formed as a clump of Shadow Bugs, which melted onto the floor, scattering in random directions. Everyone alternatively lifted both their feet as the fuzz scattered pass them. The Bugs scattered away until they are no longer in sight.

The gang then watched the mysterious person land on their, it was fully revealed to be a tall, muscular man in a blue jumpsuit; he has on white and yellow gloves. gold boots, a yellow scarf around his neck, a double-edged shoulder pad on his right shoulder, two belts, one with a green holster on the right side with a black gun in it, and a red helmet around his head with a golden falcon emblem on the forehead and a pair of visors that shows two white, upside-down triangles representing his eyes.

"Heh... Sorry to keep you dorks waiting," said the man as he takes his helmet off, revealing thick, pointy hair of brown and deep eyes of blue. Everyone gasped.

"Seto!" Mokuba cried out.

**Enemies:**

**(12) - Poppant: A Poppant's trousers are full of candies and presents. As they run away, they leave a trail of its goodies; half the time, a rock will be launched from the trousers to stop intruders from approaching further. **

**(13) - Mites: These annoying little stick-figures normally form into groups. Although they're tiny, Mites can pack quite a punch against bigger foes. **

**(14) - Big Primid: They're like regular Primids, but bigger, stronger, and can take out an opponent much easier. Any weapons they obtain adapts to their appropriate size.**


	20. Chapter 20

**(Quick AN: To the person who wondered if Dartz is in the story, no, he is only mentioned at chapter 6 and the previous chapter. However, there will be more familiar characters added into the story soon, so just be patient. Anyways, on with the 20th chapter!)**

The rooftop where the gang stood was riddled with deep cracks and other damages from their battle with the Big Primid. Almost everyone stood in shock and awe at the sight of Kaiba's virtual clothing as he stood in the middle. Pegasus only grinned as he was impressed by his choice of character.

"Well, it's about time you've showed up, Kaiba-boy," said the white-haired man.

The egotistical brunet smirked as here turned his head at the blonde swordsman behind him, seeing him with the corner of his eye, "And it's about time that Joey has another skirt-wearing fairy boy to hang out with," he rudely retorted. Pegasus wasn't offended.

Blushing, Joey glares at a snickering Tristan beside him before glaring at Kaiba in anger and jealousy, "Hey, jus 'cause you're posing as a super-cool character like Captain Falcon doesn't give you da right to insult my choice for an avatar!"

Captain Falcon is a professional racer from a racing game called F-Zero. He was one of the most loved characters in both his game and in Super Smash Bros. Though he never fought in his own game, he shows his worth as a fighter with an incredible mix of karate, taekwondo, kung-fu, and street fighting, thanks to his second life as a pro bounty hunter. He can fight with incredible speed and all of his limbs, his signature move is the powerful Falcon Punch.

"Hm, whatever," Kaiba said before turning his head away. He surveyed the cracks and holes around the area. "Looks like you geeks just got an example of our _real_ mission."

Confusion was written all over everybody's faces, excluding Pegasus and Mokuba. They all exchanged looks before Yugi finally asks.

"What are you talking about?"

The grin that was on his face erased as he turned his head to Pegasus, "You two still haven't told them yet?"

Mokuba answered before Pegasus could, "I was going to tell Yugi, but that ginormous Primid showed up and almost destroyed this building."

The rest of the group murmured, wondering what they're missing.

Yugi remembered that Mokuba was going to tell him something before the Big Primid attacked. Joey knew that something's up between Kaiba and Pegasus. He suspected that something special would happen on the day that Mokuba delivered the virtual helmets to them. He and others were so blinded by the hype that the headwear gave them, they completely forgot about their debate on whether to trust two bickering company presidents or not.

Kaiba turns his face forward, "Well, they'll have to know eventually. And I think now's the time." He puts his helmet back on?"

"Kaiba, what is going on?" Yugi was the first to ask.

"Follow me back at the tower," said Kaiba, not tempted to turn to anyone, "There's something you all have to know."

Everyone had a weird feeling about this.

* * *

><p>The current time at Smash City became nighttime, just like in the real timeline. Everyone arrived in the rec room. Kaiba, Mokuba, and Pegasus sat on the three-man chair. Yugi sat next to Tea in the loveseat. Bakura and Serenity are sitting on the recliner chairs. Tristan and Duke leaned against the pinball machine-like Coin Launcher game contraption, and Joey and Mai leaned against the wall next to each other somewhere. Kaiba sat his feet on the glass table with his arms crossed.<p>

Everything was silent for about a minute. Everyone has been itching to find out what Pegasus and the Kaiba brothers wanted to tell them since they were given the virtual helmets.

Finally, Yugi broke the silence by, once again, being the first to ask, "So... what's this about?"

Nobody answered. Mokuba sat with his hands on his knees, eager to tell. He looks at his brother and Pegasus for a moment. He wondered whether they're going to answer or maybe he should. He looks away and takes a deep breath, trying to find what he was going to say to Yugi. He finally starts.

"It all started a few months back, a few days after we all left Egypt..."

**(Flashback)**

_It was a dark, rainy night in Domino City. Thunder boomed across the city. Raindrops are sliding down the glassy walls of Kaiba Corporation. Kaiba was in his office, typing in his computer. He has only his desk lamp turned on for lighting. After Kaibaland has finally completed, he figured it's time to work on a new project. He decided to plan on building a school that teaches kids and teens how to play Duel Monsters._

_"Hmm," he mumbled, laying his chin on his fingers, "I need to give this school a name before I continue."_

_Mokuba was sitting on a chair across from his brother, playing on a handheld game with the volume on mute. "How about Duel School?" He suggested, not taking his eyes off the game._

_"No, too simple."_

_"Duel Monsters U?"_

_"Too colleague."_

_"Well, how about-"_

_Mokuba was interrupted by a loud, repeated knocking on the door. The hard knocking startled Mokuba as he took his eyes from his game and turned towards the door behind him. He exclaimed, "Who's that?!"_

_"And how did they get past my security?" questioned Kaiba, springing up from his chair. The loud knocking continued, getting louder and faster. Mokuba becomes intimidated as he hopped out of the chair he was sitting as well. The older Kaiba brother gritted his. "Who's there?!" he yelled, demanding an answer and reason for such a rude request._

_The door sprang open, revealing a person who fell on the office floor. Mokuba ran around the desk and hid behind his brother. The Kaiba brothers looked at the fallen figure. Due to the person being in the unlit portion of the room, they couldn't make out what the person even looks like. The person raised their head up and spoke, "please, you must help me..." It sounded like a man._

**(Back to reality)**

Mokuba continued, "This man came into the office. He asked for our help, but we didn't know why he needed our help, until..."

**(Flashback)**

_The mysterious man struggled to get up, but he slowly managed. "Mr. Kaiba," he said slowly._

_The said president just glared at the man, "Just who are and how did you get here without my knowing?" he questioned in a demanding tone as the man walked over to them._

_"Please, Mr. Kaiba, listen to what I have to tell you..."_

_He slowly walks towards them, hoping not to alarm the two too much, and reaches for his shirt pocket._

_The brothers reacted as if he's about pull out a harmful weapon. The man lifts his other hand comfortingly, "Please, calm down," he said, meaning no harm. He digs into the small pouch before slowly pulling out a tiny object. He brings it forward into the lighted part of the room to show them what it is. Seto and Mokuba made out to what object it is, it seems to be some kind of computer chip._

_Mokuba asks, "What's the chip for, to hack into our system mainframes?"_

_"This is no ordinary chip," said the man weakly, "I know this sounds crazy, but there are living spirits of monsters locked inside the device."_

_"Huh?" Mokuba's eyes widened a bit, but Kaiba's not buying it._

_"Just what are you trying to pull?!" yelled the unconvinced company owner._

_"Nothing, just please hear me out," plead the man. "There are really digital monsters crammed inside this chip. **( AN: ****No****, I am not referencing Digimon!) **Have you heard of the game called Super Smash Bros.?"_

_"You mean that fighting video game series with a roster of famous Nintendo characters?" asked Mokuba._

_Kaiba asked next, "What does that have to do with anything?"_

_"Well," the man begins to explain, "the next installment, Brawl, has finally been finished with development. It was a story mode called The Subspace Emissary, which will have cutscenes, monsters, and bosses. I'm one of the designers of the monsters."_

_Kaiba raised an eyebrow as the man described his occupation. "And?"_

_"One of the bosses is a legendary monster called Tabuu. He's a blue, humanoid figure with giant wings, like a butterfly. Have you heard of him?"_

_"I may have read a book or to about him."_

_"Well, it may sound crazier, but I met him."_

_"What!?" exclaimed Mokuba._

_"Just a few hours ago, I was traveling through a forest one, because walking helps me with ideas on monsters. I had my bag full of sketchbooks and computer chips with me. And that's when I saw him, floating before me. Legends have that centuries ago, this evil creature once tried to conquer the world, but he was locked away somewhere by the Gods. I don't know how he escaped, but I think he just escaped somehow. I was very frightened. I ran away, with my bag in hand. Thunderclouds appeared and lighting scattered everywhere. While I was running, this chip flew out of my bag, I was too busy running for my life to notice. Then, I tripped and fell on the ground. I turned around to see Tabuu floating closer to me. I was paralyzed with fear, I thought that this would be the end of me. But then, when he floated above the fallen chip, a bolt of lightning came down and struck him. I laid there, watching frightfully at the demon being electrocuted. I blocked my eyes with my arm to look away from the fearful sight, hearing nothing but electric crackling and Tabuu's moaning in pain. When the electrocution stopped, I heard nothing else. When I reluctantly looked back at the scene, Tabuu had disappeared, nothing but this lone chip laying on the ground. When I weakly got up and picked up the chip, I heard a horrible voice calling from the chip. It called, 'Free me, or else', so slow that it curdled by blood. Then the chip started to shake on its own, and-"_

_His long explanation finally interrupted when the chip he holds started to vibrate violently._

_Mokuba gave a startled cried, Kaiba gave a surprised, "What trickery is this?!"_

_Before anyone can answer, a light flashed from the chip and a small, blue portal could be seen in front of it. Everyone gave a startled cry when a blue arm slowly reached out of the portal, while an eerie voice called out, **"Freeeee meeeee, orrrrrr eeeeelse..." **_

_"Oh, no! He's trying to break free!" cried the frightened man._

_Mokuba began to freak out awhile Kaiba tries to think of a way. He quickly thought of something and looks at Mokuba over his shoulder, "Mokuba, give me your game!"_

_Mokuba stopped quivering and looked up at his brother with big, reluctant eyes. "But I just got this game system!" He protested, not knowing what his brother will do with it._

_"I'll buy you another one, now just give it!"_

_He groaned, "Ok." He give Kaiba his portable game console._

_Kaiba opens a small compartment on the side of the handheld and pops another computer chip out of the system and sets it on the desk. "You!" He points at the mystery man, "Give me that chip!"_

_Despite his cloaked facial expressions, Kaiba can tell that this man is confused, but the man nodded and worriedly gave him the possessed chip. First, he pushes the blue arm back into the portal. He eventually managed to push it back through the portal. The voice cried out the same words again before the portal closes up. Its voice echoed when it did. Next, he inserts the cursed chip into Mokuba's game system and closes the compartment. The handheld game system shook in his hands before finally calming down._

_Mokuba sighed of relief at this, "Well, I can see that you weren't kidding."_

_"That chip contains a copy of the game's memory, and data of every other monsters I've developed," said the man before looking at the floor "One of them tried to get out before I came here. Tabuu must have placed a cursed on it when the lightning trapped him within it. He probably has my monsters as his minions by now."_

_"How pleasant," said Kaiba sarcastically._

_"So what now?" asked Mokuba._

_"Well, I figured that if a chip as defective as that one can still be treated as a regular chip, then maybe we can conceal its prisoners by trapping the chip in a computer or something."_

_"To make it stable?"_

_"Exactly. I would've gone to my workplace, but I wasn't sure if our technology would be powerful enough to keep the monsters in the chip, but I know a company with technology that is."_

_"So, I'm guessing you're referring to this one?" questioned Kaiba. The man nodded._

_"Your business company, the Kaiba Corporation, has some of the greatest tech in the world, and the most powerful, too. Maybe if you can find a way to keep these monsters locked, we'll be safe. Though, I'm not sure how long we can prevent them from escaping..."_

_"And if they break free, how can we stop them?" asked Mokuba._

_"I don't know, but I think I know a way how we can take them on from the inside."_

_"What?" asked Kaiba._

_"I heard you made a virtual world once, Mr. Kaiba."_

_"Yeah, well it would've been successful if some former employees of mine haven't ruined everything."_

_"Well, I figured maybe you could make a new one, or perhaps make something that can connect your mind to the world of Smash Brothers."_

_"What?"_

_"Think about it, I'll ask my bosses if we could make a deal and work together on a new way to play Super Smash Brothers Brawl. I'm sure they'd be honored to work with someone as good as you. But we should probably keep the possessed computer chip a secret. We wouldn't want them to freak out over a blue demon cursing our games, even if they don't believe us. But what I don't know is how we set things in order."_

_"Well," Mokuba began, "We do have a new internet server, a type of supercomputer."_

_"Great. We place the chip into the software, find a way to connect our minds into that server, and defeat Tabuu and the minions he controls."_

_"And how do you suppose we do that?" asked Kaiba._

_"You're Seto Kaiba, you can do anything you put your mind to it."_

_Though Kaiba doesn't show appreciation, he mentally smiled briefly from the compliment, inflating his ego. He quickly went back on topic. "But, wait, how do we even know that this could all work out? It doesn't make any sense."** (Nether does this chapter, probably.)**_

_"We have to stop Tabuu. I wish I could think of another idea, but that's all I could think of."_

_"Wow, and you thought of all that in just a few hours?" asked Mokuba._

_"Well, I guess you could say I'm a good quick planner. So will you do it?"_

_Kaiba didn't answer yet, he just stared at the blank man. He then looks down at Mokuba's game system, which is now surrounded by dark blue aura of evil. He then starts to think. He had no beliefs of anything supernatural before those experiences with Dartz, the dragons, the Orichalcos, and all that mumbo jumbo. And also that time when he, Mokuba, and everybody else witnessed that final duel between Yugi and the Pharaoh. What reason is to not belive that a blue man with butterfly wings is trapped inside a computer chip and is now possessing a copy of the game and is threatening the world and his company when he escapes?_

_He looks down at Mokuba, who also has concern in his face. "Fine, I'll think about it. But just know, that I'm-" as they both turned back at the man, he was nowhere to be seen. The brothers looked around the half-dark room, but found no trace of him. Did he really just vanish? Figures, he thought, looking back at the cursed handheld in his hand. If what that man said was true... and if that's the only way we could stop this monster..._

**(Back to reality)**

Everyone in the rec room remained silent for a moment. Surprises were written all over everybody's faces. Finally, Joey broke the silence, "So let me get dis straight, dis weirdo came into your office, told you about Tabuu, dis blue butterfly man who were trapped in a computer chip by lightning?"

"And he said that he needs to stay in said chip or he will destroy us all?" added Tristan.

"And that to do that we need to lock him up in some software and send our minds into the system to keep him at bay?" added Mai.

"Well," answered Mokuba, "If you put it that, pretty much."

Bakura asks, "And that man just vanished? You don't know his name?"

"We don't even know what he looks, or how he got into my company without my knowledge," said Kaiba. "He was in the dark the whole time."

Remembering and thinking about the demon they mentioned, Tea looks at Yugi, who has a mix of fright and surprise in his violet eyes.

Duke asks, "So, what happened after that?"

Pegasus speaks next, "Well, believe it or not, but that same fellow barged into my room without my knowing and told me the same thing."

"But why you too?" asked Serenity.

"Well, apparently, he figured Kaiba-boy might need my help with that situation, and he predicted right. Sure, whatever he said seemed hard to be true, but when I called Kaiba-boy, he told me the truth. If a non-believer like him believes it, then I know that it must be true. So, I told that man that I'll see what I can to help save the world again, as much as Kaiba and I are very reluctant about it."

"Did _you_ see his face?" asked Tristan.

"No, my office was half-lit, too. And when I wasn't looking, he disappeared on me, as well."

"Well, dat figures," said Joey.

"So, anyway," said Kaiba, "after me and Pegasus made a deal with Nintendo, I came up with a brilliant idea; that's when the virtual helmets came in."

"That's right," said Pegasus, "We came up with an idea to make helmets that can send your mind to the video game. We already made a dozen of helmets for 'testing', and that's when _you _come in, everyone."

"Huh?" said everyone, excluding Yugi.

Mokuba tells next, "You see, Tabuu is hidden at the end of the Story Mode. We need to pass through other levels to get to him, and it requires a total of four players to battle each one, and only one or two can roam around at a time. Seto said that since he and Pegasus will be busy with other things most of the time, they don't want me to have to tackle the Mode by myself. So, Seto sent me to deliver the helmets to you guys."

"You needed our help?" Duke asks. Mokuba answered with nod. "But, why didn't you guys just tell us?"

"Well, we thought you were trying to make peace after everything that happened. We didn't want you to freak out, or at least _I _don't."

"So lets get this clear," said Tristan "We need to enter the Story Mode, beat all the levels on the way, and defeat this powerful demon that could conquer the world?"

"Yep."

"But how?" asked Mai, "If that thing is capable of world domination, then how are we supposed to defeat him when we get to him?"

"Well, we're not exactly sure how we can defeat him," said Pegasus, "but we are pretty sure that if we manage, we can stop them from escaping the game."

"Dis is getting more confusing by da minute," said Joey.

"We placed the chip they're in inside a special supercomputer, where are minds are in right now," informed Kaiba. "We use that supercomputer as an internet server and virtually transer our minds into the game, via virtual helmets."

Joey faces towards Yugi. He sees him looking down at the floor with worry in his face. "Yuge?" Joey asks.

"That blue man," Yugi's voice was slow and broken with fear. Everyone turns their attention to the spiky-haired boy. "It can't be..."

"Yugi, what's the matter?" asked Mai.

"Wait a minute," Tea began, before turning hers eyes on Pegasus and the Kaiba brothers. "Has this 'Tabuu' spoke? Did he say something like, 'Free me, or else.'?"

Kaiba and Mokuba gave the brunette-in-pink a surprised look. Mokuba answered, "That's right! How did you know?"

Everybody spent a moment staring at her, but Tristan spoke first, "Yugi kept having this dream about being attacked by this blue dude. Yugi said that before he attacks him, he says those four words in a really creepy way."

Everyone was shocked at this.

"Yugi," Tea places a hand on her friend's shoulder. Yugi paid no mind to her, he was still too busy looking at the floor, thinking back at the awful dreams he had.

_I kept having that same dream about that monster over and over, _thought Yugi. _Were they dreams, or were they... visions?_

"Guys?" said Tea, "I get the feeling that Yugi's nightmares, were more than just nightmares," she stated, looking at the traumatized friend. "I think they were more like, premonitions?"

"Premonitions that warned him that something chaotic will happen?" asked Bakura.

"Yeah," Tristan agreed. "That must be why he keeps having them, because something's telling him that something bad will happen."

"A constant warning that can't be ignored," added Mai.

"Well then," Kaiba lifts his feet off the table and sat up straight, "It looks like we have another world-saving job to do."

"Aw, man," Joey complained, "An' ta think we were done with all da mystical business since we said goodbye to da Pharoah!"

"Joey!" Tea yells at him, motioning to Yugi.

The blonde sweat-dropped. He scratched the back of his head. "Sorry, Yuge," he chuckled nervously.

"It's alright, Joey." Everyone turned their heads towards Yugi. He raises his head up, "I've been through since that dream, or rather, we've all been through a lot since our first encounter with the Pharoah. We've all gone through insane experiences during all these events we participated in: Duelist Kingdom, Battle City, the Orichalcos, the KC Grand Championship, Egypt, and others." He smiles, "But, we all worked together to get pass through those things and kept the world safe many times. But now, we have a new quest in stopping evil. We have to stop Tabuu and all those virtual monsters he controlled. This event should be no different from all the others in the past."

Everyone smiled at the motivation, except Kaiba, of course.

"So," started Mokuba as he got up, "Whadoyou guys say? Care to do what we do best? Save the world?"

Before anyone answered, everyone looked at Mokuba before spending a minute exchanging looks.

* * *

><p>In the middle of dark nothingness, there levitated Tabuu, the blue, humanoid creature and new leader of the Subspace Army. He stares at a big screen in front of him, showing the gang in the rec room onscreen.<p>

"Go ahead, mortals, increase your team and come find me," he said in a deep, diabolical voice. "You will never defeat me. That one mortal may have imprisoned me, but when I am free, I will have my revenge on him, you fools, and the entire world, and it will be satisfaction that will last eternally. And the boy..." he referred to Yugi, "He had dreams of me attacking him. Well, sooner or later, his nightmare will become a reality. I look forward to our meeting."

Sickening laughter were heard around the dark world.

**(Sheesh! This my 20th chapter and it took _this _long to get to the main plot? I didn't intended for it to be this long before the plot's full reveal. Sorry if the development was kinda slow, and sorry if the plot seems confusing. Anyway, this might be the last chapter of the year. If so, then I would like to say that you guys will have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, I know I will. So, know that the gang has finally discovered their actually purpose for "testing" the helmets, what comes next? Find out next time. Later!)**


	21. Chapter 21

**(The first section of this chapter only features our Beta testers' thoughts on their actual purpose for being involved, which some of you probably wanted. This is a pretty interesting chapter. Please review!)**

This whole experience took a wild turn for Yugi and friends. They were relaxing after the Pharoah's farewell. The hype was real when Super Smash Brothers Brawl came out for Joey and Tristan. The hype was even more real when Mokuba gave them all special, virtual helmets that sends their minds into the game inside a software for testing. They get to dress as their favorite fighters inside the game, and develop their abilities, as well. They discovered a secret level in the form of a city. In the heart of the city there was a tower with a rec room at the top. They uncovered a TV that sends them in to the Adventure Mode, The Subspace Emissary. Everyone was having the time of their lives.

Everything was fun until they were told what their _real_ purpose were for testing out the helmets. A blue, demonic spirit in the shape of a man with large, purple wings almost like a butterfly's, is trapped inside the game. And he is on the urge of world domination, with the minions he controls now. Now, it's up to Yugi and his friends to go into the game and try their best to keep him imprisoned, hopefully.

Duke couldn't believe what their about to go through again. he and the others had already been through a lot of rough times in an artificial world when they were trapped in Noah's digital dungeon. At least he got to help save the world with his inspiration, Pegasus. He may know a few things about this game, but not everything about the Adventure Mode.

Bakura couldn't be too surprised about their next mission, he's used to these kinds of things like everybody else. After all, he's probably went through worse more then anybody whenever he's been controlled by the Spirit of the Millennium Ring. He _is _the vessel to that evil spirit as Yugi is to Yami. As much as he's been through a lot, he's more than happy to help save the world from chaos.

Serenity is unsure about this situation. She never thought she'd be part of this. She only wanted to visit her brother so they can finally have more family time. Ever since Battle City, where she was escorted out of the hospital by Tristan, blind, she's been through so much danger, especially when they were imprisoned in Noah's virtual world. As much as she is not suit for these kinds of situation, she wonders if she should use the opportunity to help protect the world from Tabuu. Her mother returns from her trip and she'll come and pick her up in less than a week. So since she won't be around much longer, should she help at all, or would her brother say otherwise?

Mai hasn't decided what to do. She only joined this little club because she wanted to make up for that Orichalcos incident to everyone, especially Joey. She wanted to give him a fair rematch after their last duel. She was so caught up in all the hype Smash Brothers like everyone else that she forgot what her purpose was. But now, she and the others have a new purpose of being the helmet testers. How will she be able to make up for all her screw-ups if she's involved in a mission to stop Tabuu?

Tristan was hyped for the name Smash Brothers game. He was more excited when he received a gaming helmet that sends his mind into the game itself. He didn't think he'd be a of this new objective, to stop Tabuu. He had a hunch that there's a real reason why their commissioned to test the helmets, but the hype distracted him from the slight suspicion. Ever since Serenity came to town, he wanted too impress her in some shape or form. He can't exactly do that if his competitor Duke is going to intervene between them. But maybe, if he defeat Tabuu, possibly all by himself, then it should be enough to win Serenity's. Imagine, Tristan's fantasy could be him sitting on a king's throne with Queen Serenity by his side, drinking a big cup of Duke's tears.

Tea would probably complain about this the most. All she wanted to spend quality time in normality. She wanted to hang out with all her friends without being involved in some soul-stealing, mind-trapping card-game-involved quests. But, ever since the Pharaoh's farewell and Yugi's nightmares about Tabuu, she couldn't stop worrying about him. He's been through so much, and she would have done anything to save him from misery. Now she is willing to help take down this Tabuu, with her friends, for the world, and for her dear friend, Yugi.

Joey was just as excited as Tristan about the game's releasing. They were the most excited out of the whole game, in fact. He was also psyched about Serenity staying over at his new, awesome home. Ever since the divorce between there parents, they were forced to be separated. Joey just wanted to have some free time with his precious little sister. Now that he and the others have another world-saving job to do, things aren't going to be easy for him, because Serenity could be involved, and he doesn't want her involved in **anything**, especially what happened during Battle City. He knew she'd most likely bail out, but since they haven't seen each other for a while, could she have changed for a bit? One thing for sure, he hopes that his mother will come back and pick her up just so she won't be around when some creatures start roaming around.

Yugi couldn't believe this the most, he keeps having this dream about Tabuu, and now he knows he's real, and on top of that, they have a duty to confront him, and the only way to do that is to beat the other levels to reach him. If only Yami was still around... What would he say? What would he do? What would he suggest? He always gives grand advice. But now that he's gone, he needs to solve this puzzle by himself, then again, he's not alone, he's still got his best friends on his side, even Kaiba. Now, it's up to them to stop Tabuu and keep the world at peace once again. How will they defeat them, though? Can they defeat them?

* * *

><p>It's Saturday now, the day of the Egyptian Festival. A banner hangs up on top of the front doors of Domino Museum that says "1st Annual Pharaohfestl!". People begin to enter the building. Inside are people eating Egyptian-themed snacks from a buffet. Some kids are playing Duel monsters at some spacious portions of the rooms. Parents and their very reluctant children looked at some artifacts, some taking picture.s. Their kids probably just came here for the food or a game of Duel Monsters, not really caring for Egyptian history.<p>

Yugi is in a big room of the museum, surveying the party around him. He sees some people dressed up as Pharaohs, Sphinxes, and some Duel Monsters cards, the card game is based off of actual games 5000 years ago in Ancient Egypt. Some men are dressed as King Tut, and some women are dressed up as Cleopatra. Seeing these people showing their respects for Egypt's culture made Yugi smile. Being here made him happy, despite the whole thing about Tabuu. It's been a few days, and he and the others are still thinking on what they can do with that problem. He's still a bit traumatized, but he's fighting it. Hopefully today will make things better.

He looks down at his watch, it read 9:54. _Hmm, _he thinks_, Grandpa and the Hawkins should be here by now._

"Hey_, _Yugi."

The boy turned around to see a young man walking towards him. The man has tanned skin, lavender eyes, and grayish-white hair that is shoulder-lengthen. He also has on a black tank top and tan cargo pants.

"Marik?" Yugi smiles, "Marik!"

The taller male stops in front of the other. "How are you? It's been awhile."

"Yeah, it has," Yugi nodded. "I see you've heard about this festival."

"Of course! It was Ishizu's idea."

"Really? What inspired her to come up with this festival?"

"Well, after the Pharaoh returned to his home, Ishizu figured they deserve a little appreciation for being a noble race. So, she asked the city if she could host the festival. It wasn't really, though, but we got the authorized permit."

_Huh, interesting,_ he thought, _I was kinda expecting she'd spend her life keeping Egypt in check or something. I'm surprised she chose to host one in this city. Then again, it is where Yami originated in as King of Games. _"That's really fascinating, Marik!"

"Thank you. So, you came here alone?"

"No," he shook his head. "My Grandpa, his friend, and his friend's granddaughter should be on their way. I asked the others if they could come, too."

"Ishizu and Odion are here somewhere. Perhaps we could walk around until we finf everyone?"

"Sounds like a plan. I can't wait to explore this festival."

Me too. Come on, let's go." Both Yugi and Marik turned and walked down the end of the room together. "Perhaps we could have a duel as well as most of these duelists?"

Yugi laughs, "Yeah right!"

As they walked away, a small pile of Shadow Bugs hid behind an exhibit, spying on them like a hawk.

* * *

><p>Tea walks up to the front of the museum. She has on a green jacket, a blue tank top, a pink skirt, and blue shoes. She sees so many people walking into the building. It's nice to have one day of fun, especially after being told that they have to stop evil forces again, for like the hundredth time. Not only that Yami won't help them this time, but there's a possibility that there won't be anything Duel-Monsters-related at all, and Yugi's the king of that card game. Although, since he is the King of <em>Games, <em>maybe it will apply to the game of Smash Brothers?

She shakes her head to remove those thoughts and walks towards the building. Before she could even reach the stairs, two familiar voices yelled her name. She turned to her left and saw Joey and Serenity running up towards her. Joey wears a green jacket, yellow T-shirt, blue jeans, and blue sneakers. Serenity wears a white shirt with a pink heart on the chest, blue jean shorts, and orange flip-flops.

Tea smiles as she greeted the Wheelers back, "Hey! What's up, guys?"

The siblings stopped in front of the brunette. Joey answered, "Nothin' but the sky, dat's what's up! Nyeh heh heh!"

Serenity giggled, "Oh, Joey, you're son funny."

Tea joined in, but with a nervous chuckle, "Yeah, that's a pretty good one," she lied. _Someone really needs to buy this girl a clue, _she thought.

"So, you guys made it here, after all!"

Tea turned around and the trio saw Mai walking towards them. She wears her same lavender clothing as usual, only difference is that she has a purple tote bag around her right shoulder and she wears something around her left wrist: a duel disk.

Serenity greeted first, "Hey, Mai!"

"Well, look who decided ta show up," said Joey.

"And look who decided to show up without his duel disk," she replied.

In response to that reply, Joey looked down at Mai's wrist before looking at his own. He panicked mentally, _Aw, man, _he thought, _The rematch! I fergot! An' I fergot my duel disk. Aw man, c'mon, think! Think! _But without thinking at all, he blurted out, "I NEED TA GET BACK TO DA HOUSE!"

Confused, Serenity asked "Why, Joey?"

"Uhhhhhh," he lets his mouth do the thinking, "I need ta use da bathroom!"

"All the way back home?"

"Uh, Joey?" said Tea, "I'm pretty sure there's a restroom in the museum."

Joey spoke faster, "YEAH, DAT WON'T BE NECESSARY! I'LL BE RIGHT BACK!" With that, he ran away across the sidewalk. He ran as fast as "Speedy the Porcupine", leaving a trail of cloudy dusts.

Tea and Serenity exchanged looks in confusion.

"He forgot his duel disk, did he?" asked Mai.

The other two girls looked back at where Joey ran away at. "Oh, yeah."

The blonde girl sighed, "That's too bad..." She pulls a second duel disk out of her bag. "...I have a spare right here, just in case."

Tea and Serenity turned back to Mai to see the extra duel disk in her hand. Oh, wait til Joey comes back to see that he ran all the way back and forth for nothing. The trio shared a laugh.

"Well, whatever. Forget him. Let's head inside and check this 'Pharaohfest' out," Mai suggested as she placed the disk back in her bag. The brunette and redhead nodded un agreement and followed the blonde into the museum.

* * *

><p>The three amigas find themselves inside the building. They were quite astounded by the hype this festival is giving as they look around. The people in Egyptian clothing, the snacks on the tables, some kids playing Duel Monsters, and the cool Egyptian pop music flowing around like scents.<p>

"This party's got it going on," said Mai.

"It's amazing," said Tea.

"It's so wonderful," said Serenity, "It's great we get to go someplace that'll take our minds off you-know-what."

Tea and Mai's faces turned to unhappiness. They know that when Serenity mentioned "You-know-what", they knew she meant Tabuu, their new enemy. They just had that subject off their minds.

Serenity looked back at the un-eased girls. She frowned, "Is it something I said? Oh, when I said about that 'you-know-what', you don't feel like having fun anymore, do you. I'm really sorry for bringing that up, guys."

"No, it's okay, Serenity," Tea.

"Yeah, we know you didn't mean to mention that," said Mai. She smiles, "But none of that matters now. So how about we just put this behind for now and-"

"YUUUUGIIIIII! WHERE ARE YOU!?"

Mai was interrupted by a loud, young girls voice. They turned upfront and saw three people standing in the middle of the room: two old men and a young girl dressed up in an Egyptian gown. She has Egyptian styled make-up above her eyes and she's wearing a black, shoulder-length wig. Tea smiled as she recognized the trio, and unfortunately, the young girl as well. "Hey, Gramps! Mr. Hawkins!"

The three looked behind them and saw Tea and the two other girls. Solomon happily responds, "Ah, Tea!" The two groups met up. "I see you've brought these girlfriends of yours with you."

Tea giggled.

"How are you, Tea?" asked Arthur.

"I'm doing just fine. Me, Mai, and Serenity just entered. Joey ran off home to get something."

Rebecca walks up to the taller brunette, "Pleasure meeting you again, Tea."

"Back at you." _I guess, _she thought.

"You wanna guess who I am?' she asked, flaunting her costume.

"Uhhh, Cleopatra?"

"Correct! Cleopatra, the most beautiful lady in all of Ancient Egypt!"

"I see." Tea notices that she's not wearing her glasses. "So, you forgot your glasses at home?"

"Pbft, don't be silly. Grandpa bought me a prescription for contact lenses at that new mall, Domino Heights. You see, not only this getup is to fit in with the festival, but it's also to impress my future husband, Yugi," she explained as she flips her hair, er, wig.

Tea's eye started twitching as she makes a fake laugh, "Oh, is that so?"

"Ooooooooohhhhhhh," whispered Mai and Serenity before sharing a brief giggle. Tea slowly looked over her shoulder and gave them a death stare. The gigglers placed their fists to their lips and cleared their throats.

"And look!" Tea turned her head back to the shorter girl. She waves a pink, blue, and yellow cellphone in front of her face, making Tea make an even more distasteful face. "I heard that Yugi's grandpa bought him a Dark Magician-theme cellphone, so I asked mine to buy me a Dark Magician _Girl-_themed phone. Wouldn't that be even more romantic?"

Tea narrow her eyes at the girl and thought, _"Yeah, even though __**their **relationship is teacher and student."_

"Oh, Rebecca," said Arthur, "you've always been full of interesting things..."

"Well, anywho," said Solomon, "We're looking for Yugi. Have you seen him?"

The brunette looked up at the old man, "Uh, no, sir."

"Hmm, he should be here right now. Would you girls like to help search for him?"

"Um, sure! We'll be right with you."

"Very well, then," said Arthur. "Come along Rebecca.

Solomon and the Hawkins turned and walked away in search for a kid-like teen with spiky hair. Shouldn't be too hard to find him, right. Rebecca turned her head and stuck her tongue out playfully at Tea, fuming the brunette even more. She "grrrrr'd" as she raises her fist up.

"Wow, Tea. I didn't know you have competition," said Serenity. "In fact, I didn't remember you having a thing for Yugi."

"Yeah, it looks you and Little Ms. Stuck-Up Pipsqueak over there will (not) get along real well," remarked Mai, with her arms crossed and a smirk on her face.

Tea makes another fake laugh, "Funny. Come on, let's go," she grumbled as they catch up to the other trio.

* * *

><p>Yugi and Marik trotted across a corridor, the walls are filled with ancient artifacts.<p>

Mariks down on Yugi, "So, Yugi, how's your life been? Anything new?"

"No, nothing special," he replied, looking down.

The dark-skinned man frowned when he noticed the sad look on Yugi's face, "What's the matter, Yugi? Is something wrong?"

"It's nothing, really."

"Oh. come on. You can tell me. We're friends now, aren't we? Tell me what's bothering you."

Yugi looks up at the taller male. He sighed, "Ok... About a couple of weeks ago, I started to have this same nightmare about a blue spirit named Tabuu. He says, 'Free me, or else', in a really creepy way. Then, he makes a weird blade appear and starts to slash at me, but that's when I wake up. I kept having that same dream until a week after."

"Wow. Sorry to hear that."

"It's okay. I'm just glad that dream finally got out of my system."

"So, then why are you still unhappy about this?"

Yugi sighed, "It's complicated right now."

The two males reached a staircase. As the walked down the stairs, a trail of Shadow Bugs slowly followed them.

Yugi and Marik made their way to another big room. This big room is the one room with the two rock carvings. One of them indicates tablets that looked like Duel Monsters cards, the other indicates the first Shadow Games between the Pharaoh and Kaiba's ancestor. The area is crowded with even more people.

Yugi and Marik looked around. Yugi smiled a bit. It sure is nice for him to come here again. He eyed at the two rock carvings. It reminded him of the day when Yami took over and he and Tea spent all day traveling around Domino City, and this is the last place they've gone to. Though, this party is starting to cheer him up, he now misses the Pharaoh even more.

Marik looks around some more until he stopped turning his head. "Hey! There they!"

Yugi snapped out of his train of thoughts and saw Marik walking away. Yugi quickly follows. The Shadow Bugs crept down the stairs and followed Yugi.

As Yugi caught up to Marik, they started to approach two more tanned-skinned people having a conversation. One is a tall man in a brown tee and black pants. He is a bald man with a black ponytail, greenish-brown eyes, and has a tattoo of Egyptian hieroglyphics on his far left half of his face. The other is a woman with blue eyes. She has long, black hair, on her front, golden, Egyptian jewelry wrapping around two locks of it. She wears an antique headband with an emerald on her forehead and a white gown that leads all the way down to her feet.

"Odian! Ishizu!"

The two people turned to Marik and Yugi. Ishizu smiled, "Hello, Yugi."

"Good to see you, Ishizu. You too, Odian."

Odian nodded, "You too. So, how do you like the festival?"

"It's great! You did a great job hosting this party, Ishizu."

"Thank you. I wanted to give the Pharaoh more appreciation," she said.

"I know. Marik told me. It's really great to be here."

Marik gratefully looked between his siblings and Yugi, even though Odian isn't really their brother. As he glanced at Yugi he spotted something moving behind him at the corner of his eye. His eyes widened, "Uh, Yugi? There's something moving behind you," he said as he points to the Shadow Bugs.

Yugi glanced at Marik before turning around. He saw nothing until he looked down, the clump of Shadow Bugs forming in front of him. It grew tall and formed a Sword Primid, holding its Beam Sword in front of its face, ready to strike.

**(AN: Here's yet another cliffhanger for you guys. This was a really interesting chapter to write. Please leave a review! Happy New Years, everyone! See you next year!)**


	22. Chapter 22

**(Sorry for the unexpected hiatus. I was unable to have internet access at home for over two weeks. The only place where I could go online is at school, but I barely had that much time to work on this chapter there. Also, I had some real life things to worry about. But now that I'm back, I'd like to add some more funny quotes for this chapter. Please leave a review, favorite, and/or follow for this story to give me more confidence on writing this. Thank you!)**

Joey finally made to his neighborhood. He walked up to the front door of his house. He was panting heavily, but what would a guy do when he just countless miles to here, all the way from town? Also, when the heck is this guy planning on buying a car once in a while? Living in a cool neighborhood and working at a high-paying job, you'd think he'd have a car by now. Out of all the things he could afford now, he just HAD to forget about getting a VEHICLE. Talk about unprepared.

"Remind me... ta get a... car... for a change," he informed himself, panting miserably between words.

See what I mean?

The blonde boy reached down and lifted his doormat, collecting the house key from under it. He inserted the gold key into the keyhole. He fidget a little until the door opens. He slowly walked inside the house.

Being through this weak condition reminded him of the hard nights at his job. We wished if only Serenity was around to rub her soft hand across his back.

Joey eventually made it to his room. He walked over to his desk. He reached for a big drawer and pulled out his deck of cards and his duel disk. He closes the drawer back up.

_Ok, I goy my desk an' my duel disk, an' I'm about to get another hike back ta town,_ he thought, _I bet the others have a better day than I am._

* * *

><p>"YUGI! Where are you?!" Rebecca yelled at the top of her lungs for her "future "husband".<p>

A few people has their their attention drawn to the crowd. The older girls are feeling a little embarrassed from the publical attention. They've been looking for said spiky-haired boy for almost twenty minutes, and Rebecca is starting to develop impatience.

"Rebecca, dear," said a sweat-dropped Arthur quietly, "I know you're growing impatient, but do you really need to yell out in public?"

The blonde girl turned to face her grandfather, "Sorry, Grandpa. I really want to show Yugi my new outfit and cellphone."

"Well, would you mind toning things down a bit?"

"Yeah, before you blow up people's eardrums?" said Mai. Rebecca glared at her.

"Come on," said Tea let's head for the basement. "He might be in there."

"Hey, guys!"

The group turned to the same direction and spotted three boys approaching them.

Tea smiled, "Hey, guys! Glad you could make it."

"Well, might as well do something on a Saturday," said Tristan as he, Duke and Bakura aproached them.

"This festival is quite impressive, indeed," said Bakura.

"Hey, where's Yugi and Joey?" Duke asked.

"Oh, we're looking for Yugi right now. We know he's got to be around here somewhere. And as for Joey, he went home to get his duel disk," answered Tea. "He forgot to bring them."

"Does he even have a car, yet?" Tristan asked.

"How would I know?"

"He should probalby start spending his money on transportation rather than food and games," spoke Solomon.

"Boys will be boys," chuckled Arthur.

Knowing that he has an opportunity since Joey is gone, Tristan decided to make a move. He walks over to the redhead, "Hey, Serenity, what do you say you and I-" He was rudely interupted when Duke came out of nowhere and pushed him out of the way. Seems like he only had half of the opportunity.

"Hey, Serenity! How about you and I walk around and have a good time? I'm sure Joey wouldn't mind!" Yeah right.

Tristan reappeared behind the raven-haired boy with a clenched fist, growling.

Serenity was about to think to think, but Tea and Mai stepped in between her and the two flirts.

"Alright, listen up you two," said Mai, pointing her accusing finger at Duke, "just because Joey is absent doesn't mean you bozos get to bother his little sister all day."

"Yeah, the last thing Serenity need is for you guys to get on her nerves while getting on _our _nerves," added Tea, glaring at Tristan, "Give her some space, will you?"

"As of now, we'll be her protectors from both of you. Do I make myself clear?"

Serenity and everybody stood there confused, especially her.

Tristan and Duke glanced at each other before sighing in disappointment. "Yes, Ma'am," they said in unison.

Bakura smiled as the tension has resolved.

"Well now that that's over," started Arthur, "Why don't we go and find-"

The old man was interrupted when they heard distant exclaims. They looked around to search the source. "Where's all the yelling coming from?" Tristan asks.

"Ooh! I bet there's special entertainment around! Like a show," said Serenity.

"In that case, why don't we go see what is happening?" Solomon suggested. "I bet Yugi's there."

"Well, what are we waiting for?" Rebecca asked. "Let's go!"

* * *

><p>The group trotted across the corridor leading to the basement. The yelling is growing louder.<p>

"Wow. It must be quite a show if it got the folks _this_ excited," commented Tristan.

"Yeah, but why does the yelling sound more like terrified than entertained?" Asked Duke.

They reached a staircase walked down the stairs. They find themselves in the big room with the Ancient Egyptian carvings. They see a large crowd of people surrounding in a big circle, telling in terror. They hear a loud banging noise in side the circle.

"What is going on?!" Exclaimed Tristan as he rushes to the crowd, followed by the others.

"'Scuse me."

"Coming through."

"Make way!"

"Sorry ma'am."

"Ow! That's my foot!"

The gang exclaimed as they struggled through this jungle of people. When Joey and Tea finally made it the center first, they see there friend Yugi bashing A Primid with a metal pipe. Pretty big mystery on where he got that pipe in the first place.

"Yugi! Stop!" Marik came up and grabbed by the shoulders. "It's had enough!" The tanned male tried to convince the smaller male to stop, but Yugi had already beaten the Primid to the point where it starts to turn back into a clump of Shadow Bugs and vanished. The Primid's Beam Sword was laying next to it, it turned to Shadow Bugs and disappeared as well.

The crowd gasped at this. The rest of the gang popped out of the crowd, looking down at Yugi and Marik. Ishizu and Odion were standing right across from the interior of the crowd, with worried faces.

Rebecca approached Yugi and wrapped her arms around his body, "Yugi! Are you hurt?"

"No, I'm fine," he responded.

Tea was shocked at this. "Yugi... was that...?"

"Already?!" Yelled Tristan

"What happened?" Asked Duke.

"This creature showed up and attacked Yugi," said Odion.

"Yeah," said Yugi as he stood up straight, Marik and Rebecca released him, "I was hoping this wouldn't happened so soon."

"What do you mean?" Ishizu asked, "what _was _that creature that attacked you?"

Solomon and the Hawkins exchanged looks, hoping to get an answer. Tristan scratched the back of his head, "Uh, it's kind of a long story..."

Just then, they all heard a familiar sound. Three more clumps of Shadow Bug appeared from somewhere in the room. Everyone turned to face the Bugs forming. Taking their place, one is a Primid, one is a Boom Primid, and the third one is another Sword Primid. In a panic, the people ran for the stairs. The gang and the Ishtar siblings stayed behind.

"There's more of them?!" Odion exclaimed.

"What on earth are those things?" Arthur demanded.

"It's kind of a long story," said Tristan, "but for now, we gotta do something about these guys!"

"And how do you expect we do that, genius?" Duke asked, "Now that these creature are in the real world, there's not much we can do."

"Appreciate the update, Captain Obvious," Tristan retorted as he grabs the pole from Yugi's hands and grips it by on end with both hands. "Anyway, you guys get out of here, I'll take care of them."

"Are you crazy?" Asked Mai.

"Listen, we've been told of what's really going on a few days ago, and already Tabuu managed to send monsters into our world," said Tristan, "until we beat the game, he's gonna keep sending his troops on us." said Tristan, "just go home, activate your helmets, and beat the other levels, it's the other way. And besides, I've beaten up a gang by myself before, so this shouldn't be any different. I'll be alright, trust me."

"You're so brave, Tristan," Serenity complimented, "You've always been so heroic ever since I've first met you. I wish you best of luck."

Tristan couldn't help but blush as he mentally felt giddy. Now if only she would at least give him a peck on the cheek, or something. Moving on, he cleared his throat. "Now, go! Hurry!"

Scowling in jelousy at Serenity's compliment to Tristan, Duke walks up to him, "Well, I wouldn't want to let you have all the glory. I'll take these losers on with you."

"Ms. Ishizu, go with Master Marik, please. I'll stay here with the boys," said Odion, looking down at her.

Ishizu looks back at her brother figure. Deciding not to argue, she nodded and joined up with her real brother.

Odion walked up beside Tristan and Duke as Marik and Ishizu head for the exit with the rest of the gang. Yugi was the only one who paused. He looked back at Triistan, Duke, and Odion, all facing the opposing trio. He starts to worry, fighting these monsters in the game world is one thing, but fighting them in the real world is a whole different story. If he and his friends die, they won't get a second chance. _Be careful, _he thought, before running up the stairs.

* * *

><p>Joey had been walking through the streets of Domino for fifthteen minutes. He's still pretty tired from running all the way back to his house.<p>

"Man, I can't wait 'til I save enough money to get some wheels," he complained. He starts to think as he continues walking, about what kind of ride he should get, and what he should call it when he gets one. He thought up "Da Wheeler-Mobile" and "4-Wheelers", that last one was a pun because his last name is Wheeler and a car has four tires. He thought about getting a black truck with a red windsheild, because it would resemble his most favorite Duel Monsters car, the Red-Eyes Black Dragon.

As the blonde continues to thnk, a black limosine drove up behind him. Joey quickly noticed the lengthy car stop right beside him. "Eh?" He wondered. The back window opened up, revealing Mokuba. "Mokuba? What's up? You on your way to the museum?"

"Joey, haven't you heard the news?"

Joey gave the boy a confused look, "Da news? What's goin' on?"

"People in Domino Museum reported that a group of teenagers and some adults are being attacked by little soldiers that came out of carpet fuzz. I'm guessing our friends and the Primids fit the description."

"What!" Joey exclaimed, shocked at what Mokuba said. _Oh no, _he thought, _Serenity and my pals... they're in trouble!_

"Sete's back at KaibaCorp checking on the internet software. He said an employee told him he saw something dark and fuzzy came out of there, and then I saw the news, so I told my chauffer to take me there to check it out."

"My sister and pals are at the museum right now! We gotta save 'em!"

"Then we have no time to lose! Get in!"

Joey nodded as he rushed to the other side of the limo, where Mokuba's sitting, and entered. Mokuba rolled up his window as the black vehicle drove away.

* * *

><p>A reporter stood outside the museum in front of the camera with a microphone to her lips. "I'm reporting to you live once again that Domino Museum has been invaded by some sort of soldiers. Most people have already evacuated, but we believe there are still a few more poor souls that are trapped iinside with these assailants, including the King of Games, Yugi Moto, the two former archeologists Solomon Moto and Arthur Hawkins, and the Egyption Festival hostess Ishizu Ishtar. The police should be here at any moment now. This is Domino News."<p>

Inside the museum, Yugi and the others are taking cover behind the big, cylindrical support beams back at the the main floor. A squad of four Scope Primids had them pinned down, they're shooting at the support beams to get them to come out.

Behind one of the pillars, Arthur and his grandaughter crouched down, embracing each other in fear, though, Rebecca prefered to be in Yugi's arms. Solomon is standing beside them. Yugi, Marik and Ishizu hide in one pillar. Mai and Serenity share a pillar, and the fourth one is being occupied by Tea and Bakura. The Scope Primids continued to fire at their pillars.

"We have to do something," said Yugi, "if they manage to destroy these support beams, the ceiling will cave in on top of us!"

"We can't even move away from these beams with these things pinning us down," Mai points out.

"So, what do you suppose we do? Any ideas?" Marik asked. A shot of lazer collided with their support beam, forcing them to cover their ears.

When a blast hit Bakura and Tea's pillar, the white-haired boy noticed a big chunk of it land by his feet. He picks up the chunk starts to think. He looked over his pillar, surveying the main floor and the gun-armed Primids, he sees the door leading outside up ahead. Eventually, he figured out a plan. "Ok, I think I know what we can do," he announced, gaining everyone's attention. Tea's the first to ask.

"What's your plan, Bakura?"

Bakura looked down on the chunk in his hand. He felt his blood racing through his body fast like racecar drivers at a racetrack as he grew more reluctant about taking this risk. "I'm going to throw this chunk at the enemies..."

"And then what?"

"...and then I'm going to run at a direction where they'll follow me, and when I do, you all race to the exit."

Shock was written in everybody's faces. Mai responded first, "Are you out of your mind? As if Tristan, Duke and Odian's ideas of risking their lives weren't crazy enough!"

"I'll be fine, I promise. Besides, it's better than being squashed by the roof if these support beams get destroyed." Everyone exchange looks before looking back at Bakura. "When count to three, I throw this chunk at them, OK?" Knowing that there's not much time left, he already starts counting down. "One... two... THREE!" He flings the chunk at the Primid squad. One of the Scope Primid shot down the chunk before it hit any of them, obliterating it into dust.

Frantically, the scared white-haired teen ran to the right. All of the scope-wielders aimed and shot at him, luckily for him, his fear made him run fast enough to dodge every shot. They chased after him, giving the others the opportunity to escape. They ran off their pillars and hurried over to the exit. As they reached the door, Yugi starts thinking about Tristan and the others, hoping that they're doing OK.

* * *

><p>With an effortful grunt, Odion whacked the Primid with the metal pipe into another one. As the two collided, they disintegrated into Shadow Bugs.<p>

"Alright, I think is the last of them," the bald man announced.

"Let's hope so," said Duke.

"C'mon! We gotta meet up with others!" Declared Tristan.

"Right!" The other two said in unison. The trio head upstairs to meet up with the others.

* * *

><p>The gang made it outside. From the news cameraman's point of view, the camera seeks the gang running down the stairs of the entrance. The reporter turned around to see the group. She places her free hand over her ear and points her microphone to her mouth, "It seemed that more survivors managed to get out of the building quite fine. Oh! And one of them is the Egyptian Festival hostees, Ms. Ishizu Ishtar!"<p>

The gang made back on city grounds, they've panted from the fusion of fear and adrenaline. They turned around to look up the museum.

"One of us better get back in their and help Bakura," Solomon suggested.

Just then, the reporter and cameraman approached Ishizu. The sun-kissed woman finds herself face-to-face with the mi and camera. "Ms. Ishtar, can you describe to us what happened in there?"

"I don't thinh I can really describe them," she answered, "There were theses monsters that came out of nowhere and attacked Yugi Moto. His friends and my brother-figure, Odion, are still in there fending off against the beasts."

From a far distance, Tea hears the sound of sirens, police sirens, to be specific. She looks to her right and saw like an army of cop cars coming their way, their red and blue lights flashing crazily.

The brunette sighed in relief, "Great, back-up's on the way." It didn't take long before the place was swarming with cop cars.

The black limo finally showed up as well. It drove it's way to the museum.

"Let's hope we're not too late," said Mokuba in the back seat beside Joey.

"Hey!" Exclaimed the blonde teen, "I can see Yuge and the others!"

Before the chauffer could drive any further, a cop car drove up and stopped in front of the long vehicle, forcing the limo to stop. A police officer stepped out of his car and ran over to the limo's front side. The chauffer openned the window for the cop outside.

"I'm sorry, sir, but you can't be here," said the officer.

"Excuse me!"

The cop heard Mokuba's voice call out. He walked over to his side at the end of the car. Mokuba openned his window and showed him his ID. "Mokuba Kaiba, brother of KaibaCorp Presidnet Seto Kaiba. I have the rght to see what's going on, despite my age," he informed.

The cop cleared his throat, "Of course. I'll let you through Mr. Kaiba."

"Thank you."

The man walks back over to his car.

_Sheesh, apparently being rich can even let you bend a few rules, _thought Joey.

As the cop car moved out of the way , the limosine continued through.

Yugi and others saw the black limo approaching their way. As it stopped, Joey and Mokuba got out and ran over to them. "Guys!"

"Joey!" Yugi called as he ran up to the blonde, followed by Serenity. As the two boys met up, they were engaged in a tight hug.

"Mokuba told me what's happenin' and brought me here in a heartbeat," Joey explained. When they break apart, they noticed the red-haired girl rushing to her brother. The siblings were engaged in a tight hug.

"Joey..." Serenity started, sobbing a little.

"Serenity..." spoke the blonde. He brushed her hair with his hand, "You had me worried. I'm really glad you're safe."

Mokuba walked up, "Is everyone OK?"

"We're fine, Mokuba," Tea answered, "But Tristan, Duke, and Odion are still inside taking on some Primids..."

"...and Bakura's facing a team of Scope Primids all by himself," Mai added.

"Alright, boys, let's move out!" Called a cop as he waves his arm in a "follow me" fashion.

The other cops ran up the museum stairs and walked into the room.

Tristan, Duke, and Odion made it to the main floor, only to discover the team of police officers rushing inside the building.

They all turned directions to see Bakura running away from the Scope Primids firing their lasers at the poor boy.

The majority of the police force pulled out their Taser guns and shot at the four creatures. The electrical cables made contact with the Primids. They do a weird dance as they were violently electrocuted. They immediately morphed back into Shadow Bugs and disappeared.

The cops started to murmur in confusion, figuring out what's going on. Bakura ran up to the trio and stopped panting heavily with his hands on his knees. "Hey... guys," he said between pants.

"Bakura, what happened?" Asked Tristan.

"Well... the... Scope... Primids... attacked... us... so I... became... the... delusion... whille the... others-" Before Bakura could say anything else, he collapsed on the floor. Tristan, Duke, and Odion watched down at the exhausted, white-haired boy lying on the floor on his stomach.

Congratulations, Bakura, now you know how Joey felt earlier this chapter.

* * *

><p>It's been about an hour since the Primid attack at the Egyption Festival. No one got hurt, thankfully. The News people left since they've collected enough story for now. The cop cars are still parked outside the museum, with their lights of red and blue flashing by themselves.<p>

Yugi and friends volunteered to help the cops clean up the mess in the museum, but Ishizu is outside, sitting in the middle of the staircase. She was quite sad that the festival turned out to be a disaster, she only wanted to pay her respects by giving Egyption culture more recognition. She is thankful that Marik, Odion, and their friends made it alright, and no one else got hurt.

Yugi exitted the building and spotted the Egyption woman sitting by herself. He makes a sad face. He decided to walk down the stairs and sat next to her. He looked at her,and spoke softly.

"I'm really sorry the festival didn't end well, Ishizu."

The woman looked at the young boy, before looking back down, "Oh, it's alright, Yugi. I'm just glad you and everyone else are safe."

Yugi looked down as well, "I really wish those things didn't have to show up so soon."

Ishizu looks at Yugi again, "What do you mean?" She asked, repeating the same question from earlier, only to get an answer, "You knew about them?"

Yug looks back at the grown woman, but as he opens his mouth to explain, the rest of the gang showed up outside.

"Hey, what are you two talking about?" Asked Rebecca.

"Is it about those creatures that attacked us?" Marik asked.

Yugi looked at the gang behind them, trying to find a way to start. "Yugi," said his grandfather, "is there something you need to explain to us about?"

Everyone exchanged looks. It seems that Solomon, the Hawkins, and the Ishtars what in on what's going on. Mokuba sighed. He has to explain everything again, but at least that way they may get even more help taking down Tabuu.

**(Again, I'm really sorry if I took too long. Hopefully my updating will go a little bit faster. Don't forget to leave a review, please!) **


	23. Chapter 23

Mokuba and the others had eplained what's going on to Solomon, Arthur, Rebecca, Marik, Odion, and Ishizu, about the Primids, the virtual helmets, the video game, the avatars the virtual world, Smash City, the Adventure Mode, Tabuu, everything from A to Z. It took them awhile to fully understand the situation 100%.

It was a rainy Sunday at Domino City. Cars drive by through the wet streets, their headlight's beaming lowly through the dim and cold rain.

Inside an ice cream restaurant called Frosty's Winterland, Joey and Serenity are seen through the window. They're in a table across from each other. The majority of the restaurant's interior were decorated with multi-colered neon lights, along with the big sign outside the restaurant. Employees wearing snowman-inspired hats serve frozen treats to some kids at the counter. Sweet smells of different types of ice cream filled the air.

Joey is eating a big bowl of banana split, while Serenity's got a parfait glass of blue cotton candy, strawberry cream and banana cream- flavered ice cream layers with whipped cream and a cherry on top.

It's been ages since they've last been here together. They used to come here all the time when they were little, back when they were a big, happy family...

While Joey is busy scarfing down his ice cream, Serenity just sat there with a glum look in her face, looking down on her ice cream. She's thinking about not only what's happened yesterday, but what's happened ever since Mokuba offered them those virtual helmets.

After Joey the glutton had finally stopped scarfing down his ice cream, he finally noticed Serenity's expression, also noticed she didn't eat her ice cream layers. "Sis? Are you OK?"

She was silent for a few seconds, but then she responded, "It's just... I'm worried... about this whole Smash Brothers thing."

With sorrow in his face, Joey put down his bowl and grabbed his sister's hands around her parfait glass. "Hey listen, sis," he spoke softly, "I should've been there yesterday when those things attacked you guys. If you're stilling about that-"

"It's not just that, Joey," she interrupted as she looks up, making eye contact with her brother, "it's about everything that's been going on, with the helmets, with the video game, with Tabuu, everything."

"I understand that, Serenity. But listen, if you want to be involved in this, you really don't have to."

"Actually, that's what I've been meaning to tell you." Joey looks at her with a confused look as Serenity continues. "Remember that first night before the Battle City finals, where Mai duels against that ninja actor? And during that duel, I said I wanted to be just as tough and brave as she is?" Joey's not liking where this is going, but he nods and continued listening. "Well I thought about this ever since Kaiba, Mokuba, and Pegasus told us the truth. Since I won't really get hurt in the virtual world, I decided that I want to help... help save the world."

Joey only gave a blank expression. He can hear the sound of soft thunder outside. He just sat there in silence for half a minute, Serenity looked at him with the same expression. Joey has always been a protective older brother, especially since their parent's divorce. He wouldn't have let her get involved in the Battle City Tournament if he new many bad things would occur throughout the duration.

There's also the one time they were trapped in that virtual world created by Kaiba's evil step-family. Despte that they wouldn't really feel any pain, Joey had still worried about his sister's safety. Then again, maybe that's the point. Serenity must think she'll be OK fighting on the new virtual world. She knew she won't feel any pain if her real body is occupied safely in the real world.

Joey should have seen this coming, but even he knew that Serenity is going to have to go over her limits, even he has to face the fact that she can't be her baby sister anymore, we all have to grow up.

Joey breathed deeply. He once again took his time before speaking, "Listen, Serenity." The redhead readies herself for his answer. "Now normally, I wouldn't feal comfortable letting you get involved in anything dat involves danger... but I guess if neither of us will actually get hurt in a game world..."

Serenity's expression brightened up, not needing him to finish his sentence. "You really mean it, Joey?"

The blonde slightly nodded, unsure but starting to develop confidence for his sister. The red-haired girl smile, "Thanks, Joey. I promise I'll make you, Mai, and everybody proud. I'll do my best."

"Dat's great ta hear, sis. But if yer gonna conquer a mission for Subspace of Emissary, at least make it a double battle and have you and me be the first to work together."

Serenity nodded. "You got it, big brother," she happily replied as she finally takes a sip of her ice cream. Joey smiled at the sight of her happiness. The rain stopped and the gloomy clouds dissapeared before a bright yellow light from the sun illuminated the ice cream shop, while the two happy siblings continue eating their cold treats.

* * *

><p>Later that day, after recovering from yesterday's attack at the museum, the gang decided to work on the Story Mode and conquer more missions. Mokuba mentioned that there are many levels, so they need to work, and work fast because monsters from the game are already finding ways to leave.<p>

For this next mission, it's going to be doubles, two players on a level at once, and Joey and Serenity are going first.

The Wheeler sibings have been materialized to a jungle. Joey is once again in his green swordsman clothing and Serenity is wearing her pink jumpsuit again. On the trail ahead of them, they see a line of new monsters. These monsters are small and brown, they have little feet, no arms, have grumpy eyes, and have big mouths with fangs **(15)**.

"Aww! Look at those cute little guys," Serenity cooed.

**"I see you're adoring those Goombas," **Mokuba's voice said. **"Those guys may look a bit intimidating, but they're pretty much the weakest minions in the game, like any other Mario game."**

Serenity sighed, "I really do hate to have to hurt them."

"It's no big deal, sis," said Joey. "Tell ya what, how 'bout I by you a Goomba plushy at da new mall later on?"

She giggled, "You're the best, Joey, you know that?"

"Yeah, I know," the blonde gloated before making eye contact with her, "So, ya remember how ta use your characta'?" She nodded. He looked back at the trail, "Great. I'll go first. Follow my lead, Sis!" He draws his Master Sword and dashes towards the enemies, Serenity quickly follows.

Joey slashes the first Goomba with his blade, killing it instantly. He jumps on to a small stage in front of him and slashes another Goomba that was walking on it towards him, easily destroying it. As he hops off the stage to the other side, he's met with a third Goomba and a yellow turtle with a green shell walking on two legs **(16) **coming his way. Dashing again, Joey sliced at the two enemies. The Goomba disappeared, but the turlt withdrew into its shell **[12]**.

Joey piks up the green shell, "These Koopa Troopas make great weapons when they're in there shells." He throws the shell at another Goomba, this time, it didn't get destroyed quite as easily, but its health bar is hanging by a thread. The blonde swordsman withdrew his sword and pulled out his bow and an arrow. He slowly shot the arrow at the small creature, finally destroing it.

Joey turned around to see his sister standing on the small platfform. She was watching his performance in amazement the whole time. "That was awesome, Joey!"

"What can I say," he shrugged in a gloating fashion, "Kickin' some butt is what I do best."

Just then, another Koopa Trooba appraoched behind him. This one has wings on the back of his shell**(17)** and it was _flying _towards him.

**"Hey, Joey! Look out!"**

At Mokuba's warnig, Joey turned around, but before he could react, the flying turtle headbutted him, knocking him all the to the bottom of the small stage where Serenity is standing on top of. He hit his head on the stage. When the blonde sat up, the winged Koopa flew toward him, ready to attack again.

But before the winged turtle can strike again, a fist collided with its face. The momentum knocked the turtle away. **(AN: If a Paratroopa, the winged Koopa, gets its entire health bar decreased while it's still able to fly, it will be destroyed, rather than safely withdraing back into its shell.)**

As Joey rubs his head, **(AN: Also, even though our heroes can't really feel pain in the game, sometimes they still rub where they're hit for some reason.) **he looked up to see Serenity standing in front of him, with one of her fists up. This caught Joey by surprise. "Serenity, did you do that?" he redhead turned around with a courageous smile across her face. The older Wheeler smiled back before getting himself up and walking beside her. "Man, we just started your first mission and already you're proving your worth! I guess you don't need much protection anymore."

"Well, at least not in this world where anyone can fight."

"Good point. Now whaddya say we kick some more butt, Wheeler style?"

"I'd thought you'd never ask. Let's do this!" They both nodded as they press forward.

A few Goombas and some Koopa Troopas later, they approached a dead end. In front of the dead end is a floating, metallic barrel with a blue circle behind an arrow painted on it, rotating on its lonesome. This made Joey excited, he told Serenity that these barrels with launches you at a certain direction where the arrow is pointing. You can launch yourself to that certain direction. TGhe two siblings got into the barrel. With the arrow pointing at the wall, they launched themselves up onto the not-so-steep cliff. Joey was right; that was fun!

And it gets better...

After defeating more enemies on the way, they reached the other end of the cliff. At the end of the cliff, the spotted another barrel there, this one doesn't have a blue circle around the arrow, and it's floating still instead of rotating. Joey said those barrals launch you automattically once you get in.

After geting in, the Wheelers were launched in to another barrel, and then that barrel launched into one with the blue circle around the arrow. The curent arrow they're in is levitating up and down. When the barrel is directly in front of another one, they launched themselves into it and then the chain of barrel blasting continued.

After eventually alnding on the edge of another cliff. They got up, exclaiming how fun that was, and proceeded their travel.

* * *

><p>After entering through another red door, Joey and Serenity appeared in the next part of the Jungle level. An orange arrow is seen, pointing to where they obviously need to go.<p>

Approaching even furthur, the siblings find a big chrome disk with a big red center. This disk is attached to the end of a long, metal pipe floating horizontally still. A Goomba is approaching the unoccupid end of the pipe.

"Watch this," Joey whispered to the redhead. He slashes the disk with his sword, when he did, the disk slide across the pipe and kncocked the nearby creature away before withdrawing back.

"Wow," awed Serenity.

"I know, right? Let's keep moving."

"Okay."

They've reached th end of the segment of this level. Joey has over 100% damage while Serenity has below 50% damage. They're on a long flat surface with a floaring platfore avove. Another metal pipe with the metal circle attached to the end is floating up and down through the platform. Suddenly, a flash of light occured and they were engaged in an unescapable battle. Coming out of nowhere were some more Goombas and some turtls that look like Koopas, but they have war helmets on and they're some kind of old-fashioned hammers**(18)**.

The hammer-wielding Koopas started flinging their hammers at the two. Serenity ducked a few hammers, but the same hammers hit Joey in the face. The blonde covered his face in facke pain. "Not cool," he complained.

Serenity gets into a fetal position upwards. She starts to spin rapidly in place, the spped of the spinning gets faster by every second. After a few more seconds, she charges at the Koopa and rammed him. The force was so great, it took away all its health and immediately dematerialized.

After slicing away a Goomba and another one of those hammer Koopas with his sword, Joey spotted something coming his way, a large bullet with eyes and arms flying towards him like a rocket**(19)**.

When the bullet comes toward him even further, the metal pipe with the ball levitated down his level. He withdrew his sword and brandished his Gale Boomerang. "Sereniy, duck!" He called out. The ball at the end of the moving pipe is right in front of the redhead. As she turns around, she see her brother about to throw hiss boomerang. He ducked as commanded before the blonde threw his weapon. The boomerang hit the metal ball, causing it to slide to the other end of the pipe, and knocked the flying bullet away, along with another Goomba that just appeared from up the floating platform.

As Serenity sat back up, another flash of light occured, the barrier moved, allowing them continue even further. Joey's damage percentage is 113, Serenity's is 56.

**"Careful, guys. Your damages are getting higher, especially you, Joey," **Mokuba's voice said.

"Relax, Mokuba. We got this," declared Joey. "Let's move, sis!"

"OK," said the redhead as they reached the edge of the cliff. Floating there is another rotating barrel. They hopped in and blasted themselves the other side. The other side has yet another red door. The got off the ground, brushing themselves off, and headed straight through the magical door.

* * *

><p>The Wheeler siblings find themselves on some kind of elevating platform. They're inside a giant cave. They see that the platform is taking them up a right light inside a giant hole that could be the exit, but they have a long way to go. Joey can tell that the fighting in this level isn't over yet, and Serenity has that same feeling.<p>

Joey is ready to take on whatever's coming their way. The world is depending on him and his friends to prevent global domination by Tabuu, even if they didn't know it. He's determined to help save the world, along with his sweet sister. Nothing can distract him from being a hero, not even-

A two-deimensional candy bar, pizza, and ice cream cone**[12]** appeared on the platform they stand. Joey looked down for two seconds and already his mouth started to slobber (virtually?). He picked up the food and crammed the down his virtual throat.

Serenity watched her brother with a sweatdrop. "Joey, we just ate some ice cream, remember?"

**"That food helps lower your damage percentage quite a bit," **said Mokuba.

Serenity looked up to see Joey's score lower by around 90% "Oh," she replied. Joey gets up.

"Well, dat hit da spot, even though I can't really taste anything," he said happily.

"That's good to hear... I guess. So now what?"

Before anyone could say anything else, they spotted two Goombas landing on opposite ends of the elevating platform. It didn't take them long to get ready for more battle.

**"Hey, guys, I think if you just stomp those Goombas, they'll die instantly."**

Joey thought that made sense. In the game they originate, simply stomping them is a breeze. Simultaneously, the two siblings stomped on the Goombas until they're flattened, destroying them easily.

"Huh, well dat was easy," said Joey. Serenity looks up and gasped.

"Joey! Look out!" She pointed upwards.

Before Joey could look where she's pointing, another Koopa wielding a hammer dropped down and whacked Joey with it. The force was so much, he was blasted away, exploding into stars. Serenity exclaimed.

"Joey!" The redhead spotted another hammer Koopa appeared behind her, along with an item beside her feet, a flower with a long, straight stem, like a stick**[13]**. She picks up the flower and held it with both her hands.

**"Serenity, careful with those Hammer Bros. They'll launch a storm of hammers at you."**

"You could've told me that the first time we've encountered theses things, Mokuba?"

**"Oh, you've already met with these guys?" **Serenity sweat-dropped. **"Sorry , I was stopping Tristan and Duke from killing while debating whether or not they should join you on the next mission." **Serenity sweat-dropped twice.

In a flash of blue light, Bakura appeared on the platform. Serenity had just noticed him.

"Bakura!"

The white-haired boy turned his head to the redhead. "Hey, Serenity. Shall we continue our mission?" She nodded before each teen face a Hammer Bro.

Before one Hammer Bro could take action, Serenity quickly swatted it away with her flowery weapon. Bakura slashed the other Bro away with his deadly, sharp claws.

After that victory, a squadron of the same bullet monsters came rocketing down at the two.

**"Watch out for the Bullet Bills!"**

Serenity and Bakura looked and gasped. With quick thinking, Bakura lunged at the first Bullet Bill. He slashed it away. It spun backwards and knocked over another Bullet Bill, the first one was destroyed, but the second one survived with an inch of its health bar left. It continued to approach Bakura.

The other two Bullet Bills came after Serenity. She threw her weapon at them, but the both dodged effortlessly.

Back in the rec room, Joey just came out of his pod and sat on the big couch next to Tea and Mokuba. On the TV before them, they see the bullet monsters coming down on Serenity. The blonde gasped, "Serenity, no!"

As the bullets came straight down at the redhead, a loud, high-pitched sound was heard. The Bullet Bills blasted away, leaving a somehow snoozing Serenity.

Joey and everyone else, including Tristan and Duke, who were sitting on the individual recliner chairs, and Mai, who was sitting in the loveseat by herself.

Bakura wiped out the remaining Bullet Bill with his wolf claws before turning to face the sleeping Serenity. "Serenity?" He walked over to her, but before he could wake her up, she woke up quickly by herself, surprising the snow-haired boy. "Serenity, why were you sleeping?"

"Oh," she got up, "it's one of my character's moves, called Rest."

"Rest?"

"Yeah. If an enemy gets close to me to the point of touching, and if I use Rest at the perfect time, they'll go sky-high."

"Wow."

"Yeah, but I don't recommend myself to do it too often. If I use Rest at the worst time, I'll be vulnerable for a few seconds." As they both looked up, they see a red door floating still. As the platform reached the door, Serenity opened it and entered through, but before Bakura could follow, the platform kept moving.

"Um, guys?" Bakura called out as the platform is lifting him up to the barrier.

**"Bakura, roll through the platform!"** Called Mokuba.

"I don't know how!" But before Bakura could do anything else, he was lifted through the barrier, blowing him up into stars.

Back in the rec room. Bakura's pod opened up, revealing the white-haired boy on the tube's floor.

* * *

><p>When Serenity materialized to another section, she finds herself falling down a jungle-like pit with a waterfall flowing. Yugi appeared beside her in a flash of blue light above her. "Yugi? What happened to Bakura?"<p>

"Not sure, but I think he stayed on that elevator a little too long. Hey! Look out!" Serenity looked back down and saw that they're falling towards a row of Jyks. Exclaiming, they managed to dodge through the electric spikeballs. They dodged through another row and some more Jyks. After a few more seconds of Jyk-dodging, the duo landed on the bottom of the pit.

Another flash flashed around the area, when it did, a giant Goomba**(20) **landed behind the two with a thud, surprising them. They turned around and looked up at the creature.

"Woah, this Goomba's huge!" Serenity said in fright.

**"That's a Giant Goomba,** said Mokuba,** "You'll take more damage if it charges at you. You can destroy it by hopping on it three or four times."**

"Alright. Thanks for the tip, Mokuba," thanked Yugi.

Without further warning, the Giant Goomba charged at the two warriors. The duo screamed as they both leaped out of the way. Next, they landed on the brown monster. Alternating their hops, twice each, the Giant Goomba had been flatten, it disappeared.

A trio of normal Goombas landed on the ground as well as Yugi and Serenity did. Unbeknownst to Yugi, a red mushroom with eyes**[13] **slide up to the his feet from behind. When it made contact, Yugi grew up to the size of a tree. Serenity looked up at Yugi's newfound growth. This surprised Yugi more, but now he won't feel like the shorty of the group. When he sees the first Goomba in front of him, he stomped with just one foot. He then did the same thing to the second. Serenity took care of the last one.

Finally, another Giant Goomba landed, but before Yugi could use his giga-foot for the third time, he was shrunken back to normal size. He yelled disappointedly, "Hey! What happened?!"

**"Super Mushrooms don't make ya big for long, Yuge, only temporarily," **said Joey's voice. **"Sorry ta burst yer bubble there... shorty."**

Yugi got so mad at that comment, he didn't noticed the large Goomba charging at him. Before he could react, the spiky-haired boy was knocked a few feet away and landed on his back, taking lots of damage. As he sat back up, the Giant Goomba came charging at him again. Before the big creature could any more damage, Serenity snuck up to it from behind and used Rest.

The same high-pitched sound could be heard, and it sent the Giant Goomba flying a little. Yugi quickly got up, only to see the redhead taking a nap. The big, brown creature landed back on the ground with an inch of its health left. It turned around to face the sleeping girl. It charged towards _her_.

**"Serenity!"** Yelled Joey's voice.

Having no time to think, Yugi dashed towards the monster from the back. Thinking he may not make it. He called out his PK Fire and launched a lightning bolt from his fingertips. The bolt hit the Giant Goomba, encasing it in flames before it was knocked out of the pit.

Serenity woke up again standing up, noticing the pit's clearing.

When a sudden sound was heard, Yugi looked behind him to see a gold door surrounded by rays of light.

Yugi and Serenity smiled. "There's a gold door!" Serenity announced.

"That means we're done with this level," Yugi stated.

**"Great job, you guys," **said Tea's voice, **"I knew you could do it."**

"Come on!" Said Yugi before leading Serenity to the shiny door. They've entered through it.

Everyone grew proud faces for Serenity's successful first run. Joey was especially proud. He couldn't believe it, his baby sister were brave and took on her first mission. He couldn't believe how fast she developed, sure, in a virtual world, she shouldn't be too scared, but still. If he was in the real world by now, he'd cry tears of joy.

The two remaining transportation pods started making whirring noises. They opened up, revealing Yugi and Serenity. They stepped out.

"Well, Serenity, how's it like to have guts for the first time?" Mai commented as the redhead sat down next to her.

"It was fun!" She answered, "At first, I thought i would totally mess up, even with your supports, but now... I've tasted courage."

"I knew you could do it, Serenity," said Duke. "I totally belived all the way!"

Tristan scoffed, "Yeah right! You probably didn't belive her when we dueled that Nesbitt creep back at that other virtual world." Duke gave him a glare.

"And how do you know that? At least I didn't lied to her about teaching Joey how to play Duel Monsters!"

And the bickering continues...

Everyone sweatdropped.

Serenity turned to Joey, who is looking back at her with a proud expression on his face. Serenity smiled at this, knowing how proud he was for taking on her first mission successfully.

* * *

><p><strong>Enemies: <strong>

**(15) - Goomba: The most basic underlings in the Mario series. Simply stomping them can kill them.**

**(16) - Koopa Troopa: Theses turtles withdraws back into their shells when they lose health or get stomped on.**

**(17) - Koopa Paratroopa: Koopas with wings. If you drain its entire health with its wings equipped, it will be destroyed, rather than withdrawing back in its shell.**

**(18) - Hammer Bro: Hammer-flinging Koopas. If the die, they don't withdraw in their shells.**

**(19) - Bullet Bill: These bullet-like creatures will keep moving towards you. They won't stop until they're destroyed.**

**(20) - Giant Goomba: Goombas that are bigger and stronger (obviously). They to three to four stomps to wipe them out.**

**Items: **

**[12] - Lip's Stick: Flowers in the form of weapons. If you hit another fighter with it, normal flowers will sprout on top of their head, and their damage percentage will gradually go up.**

**[13] - Super Mushroom: These mushrooms makes you big, but only for a short time.**


	24. Chapter 24

The gang remains in the rec room in the Smash Tower.

"Ok, our next stop is the Plains," said Mokuba, looking at the blinking light on the ground on the map. "Who wants to volunteer for this one?" He looks around. Joey is playing Coin Launcher with his spectating sister beside him.

"Me and Serenity are gonna take a break for now," said the blonde.

Mokuba looks towards the spiky-haired boy sitting beside him, "What about you, Yugi?"

"Um, actually, I need to go back to the real world real quick," Yugi responded. He raised up his wrist, and his Data Band appeared. He hit some coordinates before disappearing.

The brunette sitting on his other side spoke, "I guess I'll go. How about you, Tristan?"

The male brunette shrugged, "Sure." He got off his chair.

"Aw man! I lost again!" Joey complained as the game of Coin Launcher ended early, courtesy of the missiles that blew the rest of his coins away. He brought his head down in shame. Serenity pats him on the shoulder.

"It'll get better next time, Joey," she said in a comforting tone.

"I'll go too," Joey heard Mai's voice and brought his head back up. He sees the blonde girl get up from her loveseat. Before Mai could walk up to the pod, Joey rushes to her and grabs her by the shoulder.

"Hey, Mai?

She looks over her grabbed shoulder.

"Eh, listen. I meant to ask you earlier about our cancled rematch yesterday." He scratched the back of his head sheepishly, "If you, uh, wanna tell me when and where you wanna-"

"Joey, listen," she spoke, making Joey pause, "I know you want me to duel you just so I'll get over it, but we have a world to save, so let's not worry about it, OK?"

Joey took a moment to answer. He nodded. Mai smiled before walking towards her transportation pod.

"Ok, guys. We need one more volunteer if we're gonna get this one done," Mokuba said impatiently. Duke walks over to him.

"Why don't _you_ go if you want your brother's company to be safe so badly, Mokuba?" Asked the raven-haired boy.

The younger black-haired boy scowls at Duke, "It's not just KaibaCorp, Duke. We're saving the entire world, remember?"

"Look, I'll spectate what you guys are doing and what you're facing. I know about this game just as much as you do."

"Didn't you say that in the Adventure Mode of an original copy, you've only beaten the first level?"

"That was last week. Look, just let me man the intercom."

Mokuba sighed, "Fine." He got up and move, allowing Duke to take his place in front of the coffee table with the intercom next to Tea.

"Hey, Mokuba?" The young boy lokked back at Tea. "What do you think Yugi is going back home for?"

"I don't know," he shrugged.

"Hmm, have you, by any chance, delivered the helmets to Yugi's grandpa and the others who you've explained the plot to?"

"Yeah. Well... they weren't very sure about getting involved at first, but they said they'll think about it, so I have more helmets delivered to them anyway." He walks to the TV. Tea just watched him go. She wanted to think about something, but she decided to just drop it and followed suit.

Tristan finds himself at the start of the Plain area, an open land of green, with very few trees and a green mountain range to his left in the distance. He stood on the starting end a trail leading to his destination, where a thin, humanoid figure with a brown brass instrument for a head**(21)** is seen at the other end, folk dancing. Tristan locks all his fingers to crack them, creating loud cracking sounds, and said, "It's showtime."

He dashes at the new enemy. Before he could do any damage, the dancing creature noticed him with angry eyes and blew out a powerful gust of wind out of his "mouth". Tristan kept running, but the wind kept him in the same spot, like he's running on a treadmill. "Hey! What gives?" He complains.

**"This Borboras really _blows,_ doesn't it?"**

A vein popped in Tristan's head, "Can it, Devlin." As he stopped running, the humanoid creature now called the Borboras ceased its attack. Tristan wanted to attack up-close and personal, but if he runs up again, the French horn-headed creature will probably use its blowing abilities to keep him in-place again. Instead, he drops one knee down on the un-grassy trail and pulls out his rocket launcher. He shoots one rocket, it flew up in the air. The Borboras attacks with blowing again, pushing Tristan onto his bottom. The small, black missile came back down and struck the enemy in the head. Taking this opportunity, Tristan stood back up, performed a front-flip, and knocked the Borboras out of existence with the soles of his boots.

"Alright, Tristan!" Serenity cheered.

Tristan stepped over a tiny cliff an a couple of Primid, another Borboras on a floating plarform, and a swarm of Feyeshes up ahead.

"Well, wouldn't want to keep these losers waiting," he offered.

* * *

><p>After about a minute of butt-kicking, Tristan reached a stone cavern. Coming from the interior, a round, mechanical chicken<strong>(22) <strong>charges at him. With quick thinking he pulls out a grenade from his belt, bites off the pin and throws it at the fat chicken robot. The grenade exploded on contact, chipping away soe of the chicken's health bar. he retaliated by charging at the brunet again. Tristan takes a C4 out and sticks it onto the floor. The mechanical chicken sumo-slammed into him, knocking him on the grassy ground outside the cave. Recovered, he pulls out a walky-talky and yelled, "Now!" into it.

The sticky bomb the chicken was levitating over blew up, chipping away the rest of its health. Instead of disappearing, the robot broke in half as a hollow shell, revealing a round, yellow bird. It cowardly flew away, no longer in sight.

Tristan stood back up. He grinned. "Hmph, what's the matter? _Chicken?_" He said as he makes his way through the cave. On his way further, a yellow disk**[14]** materialized in front of him. He stops in his tracks and picked up the item. Taking a closer look, the disk has two perpendicular lines, better known as the Smash symbol, engraved on its flat surface.

"I don't think I've seen _this_ thing before," he said, observing the disk. "What is it?"

**"I think** **that's a Trophy Stand,"** Duke's voice said. **"If you toss it at an enemy, it'll turn it into a trophy version of itself."**

Tristan holds the stand up with a grin, "Cool! I can't wait to try it on the next monster I see."

**"It won't be that easy. You have to make the monster's health bar as low as possible before throwing it, otherwise, its capturing magic won't work."**

"Huh. Kinda like in Pokémon."

**"Exactly."**

Just then, Tristan heard something from behind. He turns around to see a wall that just rose up from the floor. It slide to Tristan's direction, pushing him towards down the cave. He tries to push it back in two separate positions, but the wall kept on moving without stopping. With his back against the wall, Tristan sees two fiery Jyks coming his way. He pulls out his ring-shaped device and float over both of the fiery spike balls. As he landed back down, a gift box smack right in his face, courtesy of a cowardly running Poppant, who fell down a pit up ahead.

Looking over his shoulder to see the wall closing in on him, Tristan makes a run for it. He leaps over the pit and then a second pit. Looking up, he saw yet another Borboras standing in front of him. When looking over his shoulder, the wall came closer, but it stopped and slid down. Tristan was relieved that the wall stops there, but it's short lived when the Borboras upfront started blowing at him. He slid back slowly while he just stood, block his face from the strong "wind".

Unable to take anymore, Tristan pulls out another grenade with his free hand, bites off the pin, and rolls it on the floor hard. When the egg-shaped bomb landed between the monster's feet, it exploded, stripping away most of its health and forced it to stop blowing. Taking his chance, Tristan threw the Trophy Stand at the Borboras. When it made contact, a flash of light occurred, revealing a statuette of the Borboras on top of the Trophy Stand. Walking over it, Tristan simply touched the trophy, which made it disappear.

Tristan scratches his head with his finger. "Uh, what just happened?" He asked.

**"I have no idea,"** said Duke. **"Maybe when you touch it, it's saved into some data or something?"**

Tristan shrugged, "Aw, well." He travels further. He hops onto a ledge in front of him, then down a hole. He landed on some, greenish-gray, stone blocks. He stands on one knee to examine the blocks. Tristan had seen a wall of these blocks that were blocking his past earlier. They were pretty easy to break. He punches down at the blocks with both fists. After punching his way through, he dropped down to the lower level.

Before he could act, he's met with a big boomerang to the stomach. The yellow boomerang came back to the hand of a Primid. A team of other Primid ran up to him as well.

Tristan pulls out his launcher again to take on this situation. He fired a couple of rockets, one hit the front Primid holding the boomerang, the other hit another Primid behind it. He pulls out a grenade and tossed it at the team. The blast blew most of them away. He ran further through the cave. Another Primid fell from the ceiling and kicked Tristan's rocket launcher away and punched him to the floor.

Tilting his head up, Tristan spotted a small orange flower with eyes**[15] **materialized beside him. He's seen this item during a game against Joey. It's a Fire Flower. Tristan grabs the Fire Flower, catapulted himself up, and pointed it at the Primid. Fire spewed out from its face like a flamethrower, encasing his opponent in flames. As its health bar disappeared, so did the Primid.

Running through the cave even further, he met up with another Primid that came from the ceiling. He activates the flower and sprayed more fire at his new target, but before its health bar depleted completely, the flower stopped spewing fire. Acknowledging this, Tristan takes a look at the flower's face in surprise. Tristan may have remembered what the Fire Flower can do, but what he didn't remember is that the flower has no unlimited fire-spraying.

Before Tristan could do anything else, the Primid winds up his arm and used a strong punch to knock the teen into the barrier behind him. His damage was high enough for a knockout. When materialized back inside his pod, the doors opened, revealing him holding the Borboras trophy from earlier in his hands. He wasn't sure how that trophy got in his hands, but he ain't complaining... much.

Duke just noticed the trophy in the brunet's hands. "So that's where the trophies go after you collect them," he pondered. He speaks into the intercom, "How're you hanging in their, Mokuba?"

**"I'm doing fine,"** answered the young boy in Tristan's place.** "I just took care of the rest of the Primid squad for Tristan, and I've reached a door at the end of the stone cave."**

* * *

><p>Mokuba materialized on top of a tiny cliff located back out side. In front of him is a long platform with three smaller platforms floating above it. The stage almost resembles the Battlefield stage, but the middle smaller platform is on the lower point and the other two is up on the higher point. As Mokuba steps onto the stage, it started to move by itself. When it detached from the cliff, the stage flew him about ten feet away from the cliff in midair. With a flash of light occurring, the stage was immediately swarming with monsters.<p>

"Well, this looks familiar," Mokuba said to himself, before kicking a couple of Primid off the stage. A Boom Primid behind him threw its boomerang at him. When he looked over his shoulder, Mokuba used his Reflector to bounce the boomerang right back at it. The yellow weapon knocked its thrower off the stage, along with another Primid that was standing behind it.

Hopping onto the lower, smaller platform, Mokuba was ambushed by a couple of Spaak. Suddenly, a soccer ball**[16]** appeared in front of his feet. After picking up the ball, he tossed it up in the air performs a roundhouse kick on it with a **"Kyah!"**

The black and white ball ricocheted off the first Spaak and hit the other, reducing their health and turning them black to show their weakening. In retaliation, the two cloud monsters charged themselves up and struck him down with lightning. He took a large amount of damage from the double-attack. Mokuba encased himself in flames before lunging at one of the Spaak. The target was destroyed at contact. While in midair, the raven-haired boy pull out his Blaster and shot lasers at the other Spaak, upside-down. The cloud creature didn't feel the lasers, but that doesn't stop it from having its remaining health bar reduced, resulting in dematerialization.

As soon as Mokuba flipped upright and landed on his feet on one of the higher platform, another flash appeared. The entire stage shifted down diagonally. Mokuba could already see the grassy land under him. After stopping, another flash happened. As he hopped onto the big platform, he was quickly surrounded by a quadruplet of Primid surrounded him, but these aren't like the regular Primid. These Primid are red**(23)**. Before he could see it coming, a spit a fire hit him in the back. He turned around and used his Reflector to reflect another fire spit that shot from the red Primid's... mouth? The fire hit the spitter. He then leaps up and kicked it another red Primid off the stage.

Unbeknownst to him, one of the red Primid snuck up, tilted its head back with its hands covering its "mouth", as if it's charging up an attack.

**"Lookout, Mokuba!" **Warned Duke. But before Mokuba could turn around, the red Primid fired (no pun intended) a breath of flames at him. Yelling in agony, the boy was engulfed in the flames before he was knocked out of the stage, exploding into blasts.

A few seconds later, Mai appeared to take Mokuba's place. Before she started, a plate of curry with a spoon included**[17]** appeared by her feet. She picks up the plate. _Hmm, I wonder how this will help, _she thought before holding the plate on her arm cannon. She takes the spoon, took a scoop of the red food and puts it in her virtual mouth. A few seconds later, her eyes widened and her face slowly turned pink to red. Before she knew it, a barrage of fireballs fired out of her mouth. She tries to cover her mouth as she frantically dashed back and forth. While dashing uncontrollably, a lot of the fireballs started harming the red Primid, damaging their health.

Shock was written in everybody's faces. Joey was the first to react.

"Woah! What's going on?! I thought you said we can't feel anything hear!" He turned at Mokuba, who just seated next to Duke a few seconds ago.

Mokuba shrugged, "You got me. I thought so too, at least, that's what Seto told me. Maybe Tabuu and his servants hacked into the software or something and altered our sense systems."

**"Either that or your brothers a big fat liar!"**

Everyone looked at the screen to see Mai standing on the emptied stage that started shifting again.. She was panting with her hands on her knees and her tongue sticking out. "Now that's what I call 'Fight fire with fire'," she said.

The stage stopped in-place and another light flashed.

A couple of Primid landed on the top platforms, and Glunders appeared on the main platform with Mai in-between. Recovering from the fiery foolishness, Mai places her hand over her arm cannon elbow in readying for combat. The two Glunders rolls to her. She sweep-kicks both of them before they could stop and use their electrical attacks, annihilating them immediately. Two Primids came down from the higher platforms, onto Mai's level.

A giant hammer**[18] **appeared right beside Mai. "Ooh, I think I'll have fun with that," she said, observing the hammer before grabbing the hammer by the handle. The next thing she knew was not at all expected. She finds herself swinging the hammer up and down uncontrollably the two Primids she was between was knocked away instantly.

"Does this hammer have a mind of its own?! How do you control this thing!?"

Suddenly, a Borboras came into view and blew her off the stage. Mai is still swing the big hammer. She couldn't recover back upstage, she couldn't even let go of the hammer, it's like her hand(s) has been superglued to it. Unable to do anything, she fell through the barrier and exploded into blasts.

"Wow, karma's a real jerk, is it?" Mokuba commented, hearing the sound of Mai's pod opening.

A moment later, Tea appeared on the stage, knocking the unsuspecting Borboras offstage with her crown.

After another flash, the stage shifted once again. This time, the stage attached itself to another cliff. Another flash happened. The stage was once again swarming with enemies.

"This has got to be the last wave," Tea stated. "I could see Rays of light off in the distance."

She puts her crown back on and brandished her pink parasol. She uses the umbrella like a shield to blocked a fiery projectile spat from one of the red Primid. The other red Primid tries to sneak up on her and use a fiery blast attack, but Tea whipped around and replaced her parasol with a Toad. When the fire hit the mushroom-headed boy, he released a green gas and knocked the Primid off the stage. Tea then replaced her Toad with a golf club and whacked away the first red Primid that was creeping up to her.

Another Borboras came down to Tea's level. It tries to blow her away. She blocks her face from such force. She thought about tossing one of her turnips at it, but they're probably too light to pass through the turbulence, and floating by her parasol would also be a bad idea too. With her club still in-hand, however, she threw as hard as she can at the blowing monster, it was powerful enough to send it flying offstage.

Finally, two Spaak came from the sky, attempts to zap at her. She pulls out her parasol and uses it like a shield again to block off the electric orbs. While under her umbrella, a Smart Bomb was virtualized by her feet. She picks up the dishlike explosive. The Spaak struck lightning at down her umbrella. When the attacking finally ceased, Tea tossed the bomb at the cloud monsters. The exploding bomb created a radius that caught both Spaak. When the explosion disappeared, so did the Spaak. One more flash occurred.

The area is completely cleared. Tea looked around before she spotted that ray of light she glimpsed over. A passageway the stage was attached to lead to the light rays, where a gold door stood beneath it. Tea sighed in relief, knowing that she had completed their latest mission.

* * *

><p><strong>Enemies:<strong>

**(21) - Borboras: These common monsters delivers a blast of wind. It's pretty annoying, but not particularly dangerous. **

**(22) - Ticken: A giant, metallic chicken. When defeated, its "body" falls apart, revealing a bird that was piloting the machine.**

**(23) - Fire Primid: A red Primid that spits fiery projectiles. Sometimes it charges up for a powerful attack.**

**Items:**

**[14] - Trophy Stand: When an enemy is weak enough, you can turn them into collectable trophies with these stands.**

**[15] - Fire Flower: The user spray flames from these flowers. **

**[16] - Soccer Ball: Use a smash attack to launch these balls at your enemy. You can't pick them up in the real game.**

**[17] - Superspicy Curry: When eaten, the consumer uncontrollably breaths fire. They can't walk, and they'll always dash frantically.**

**[18] - Hammer: Once someone wields this hammer, they will swing it up and down with no control. It can K.O. any target, but if you fall off the stage, you are totally doomed.**


	25. Chapter 25

Tea's pod opened before she walked, feeling great after being the one who completed the latest level.

After she walked out, what she saw sitting on the individual recliner chairs was quite surprising and interesting. On the front chair is Yugi's grandpa, Solomon. He's wearing blue overalls over a red shirt, brown shoes, and a red cap with an "S" on the front. The one sitting on the farther chair is Rebecca's grandpa, Arthur. The taller old man is wearing similar clothes like Solomon's, but his shirt and cap are green, and the cap has an "A" on the front. Yugi stood between the chairs they're sitting.

Tea smiled. "So that's why you left for a while," she said to Yugi, "You've brought along my favorite heroes. I'm surprised you brought them here so quickly."

"Well, when Mokuba delivered the helmets to Grandpa and Mr Hawkins, they didn't hesitate to try them on," Yugi explains. "Grandpa wants to experience the world of Smash himself, and Mr Hawkins wanted to _discover_ the magic behind mind-sending technology."

"Seeing hologram-projected monster's was already an interesting discovery," said Arthur. "I'd also want to discover the monsters that attacked us yesterday."

"Yeah, discover the monsters that tried to destroy us," said a sarcastic Joey. " Maybe if they're not too evil . they'll even let you discover their super-dangerous toys."

"Joey!" exclaimed Yugi.

"Ignore him," said Tea. "Hey, where's Rebecca?"

"She's picking on a character herself," answered Arthur. "There weren't many other female characters to choose from, so she may not be with us for a while."

"Well that's good news," the brunette said under her breath.

"So, this is where you kids have your missions?" Asked Solomon.

"Yeah," Mokuba answered, "We have four of step into the transportation pods between that TV. If we manage to take down a level, a new level gets unlocked. There's going to be a lot of levels, and we've only finished five of them."

"Which is why we're doing the best we can to get all these levels done to stop the Subspace attack," Yugi added.

"Sounds like it's going to take quite a while," said Solomon. "Do you know exactly how many levels there are?"

"No, but there's going to be much more than we can count, most likely," answered Mokuba.

"You know, I've been wondering," Arthur spoke.

Tea asked, "What is it, Mr. Hawkins?"

"You know how those Primid from yesterday came into the real world and knows where we were? What if they know where we live, and most importantly, what if they find our bodies occupied with the helmets?"

"You mean what if they reach our occupied bodies without our knowing?" Asked Mai.

"Precisely."

"Oh, we've already got that figured out," said Mokuba, "See, during the development of the virtual helmets, Seto and Pegasus installed a special warning alarm. If a Subspace creature or any other untrusted intruder approach our bodies in a one mile radius, the helmets gives a signal, creating an alarm that will sound out from our Data Bands." Yugi wondered if that will work if Rebecca comes too close to his body.

"Mokuba told us that earlier today," said Bakura, "So if our bodies are endangered, we'll be given a signal and we can leave the game and back into our bodies and hopefully fend off the beasts."

"Ah, now that's thinking ahead," said and impressed Solomon, rubbing his chin.

"I know, right?" Said Mokuba.

"But what if they approach us while we're asleep?" Asked Arthur again.

"The helmets can do the same thing when you're not using it. It'll act as your alarm clock by sounding an alarm if an enemy gets close, even if they're not active, like a Sleep Mode. Impressive, right?"

"Very impressive, indeed. I have to say, it must have been nice being the brother of an ingenious man working with another genius."

"Thanks, Mr Hwakins. Okay, how about we take down one more level for now?"

"Ok, count me in," said Yugi. He looks down at his grandfather," you can watch me from the TV. It'll be like a demostration in case you and Mr Hawkins wanna try."

"I'd like that very much," Solomon nodded. "I can't wait to see how you and your friends fight those dreaded monsters."

"In dat case, count me in too, and make it 2-player, Mokuba," Joey declared, walking up between Yugi and Gramps. "I want Gramps to see how well me an' his grandson work as a team."

"I'd like to see that very much."

"Who else is comin'?"

After a few moments, Mai responded with a raised hand, "I'll go."

"Me too," said Bakura with a hand up.

Mokuba announced, "Great! Next stop: the Jungle!"

* * *

><p>Inside their pods, Yugi, Joey, Mai, and Bakura have disappeared into light. Soomon, Arthur and everybody else watched as their pods stopped whirring and the TV's visuals swithched from the map to a large lake. Yugi and Joey materialized on a narrow area of land between a jungle and the lake. The field is surrounded by the barrier, of course, Yugi and Joey can see it, but not their spectators.<p>

Yugi looked around, "Where are we? Isn't there supposed to be a trail with monsters waiting for us?"

"Ya got me, Yuge," Joey answered his partner's question, turning his head over his shoulder to look at the jungle, "Maybe we need ta head through dat jungle, or somethin'."

Suddenly, little bubbles started to form on the surface of the middle of the giant lake. Yugi and Joey can barely hear the distant bubbling. They see the bubbles on the surface. The bubbling then stopped, but after a moment, something long, and snakelike wormed out of the water were the bubbles formed.

Yugi and Joey looked in shock at the sky where the giant snakelike figure is flying around. They couldn't tell what it is, but before they can think further, the creature swooped down and grabbed Yugi with its hand.

"Yugi!" Joey cried as the monster flew past him, his cap flowed violently from the wind it created. The giant flew back to the lake and stopped, levitating above the surface with Yugi in its hand. As the spiky-headed boy tries to pry from its grips, it finds himself looking into the yellow eyes of his kidnapper. The snakelike creature has a green body with yellow, organic patterns all over its body, black eyes with yellow irises, to long spikes on the curves of its head with two smaller spikes on its chin, parallel to the spikes on its head. Face-to-face with Yugi, it makes a dreaded roar, frightening Yugi.

"What in Pharoah's name is **that**?!" Exclaimed Solomon.

Mokuba answered, "It's Rayquaza, the Sky High Pokemon!"

"And it's got Yugi!" Tea added.

"Hey!" Called Joey, readying his arrow at the dragon. "Keep yer freaky claws off my pal!" He shot the arrow at the dragon's hand where Yugi is held in. When it made contact, it made Rayquaza loosen his grip on Yugi. He fell off the hand and dropped down into the lake, making a big splash. Yugi's upper body resurfaced. He spits out virtual lake water that traveled in his mouth before swimming back to land.

Stalling the dragon so Yugi can resurface back on land safely, Joey shoots more arrows at the Sky Dragon, but Rayquaza dodged every one of them. He throws his Gale boomerang, but the green monster swiped it away with its tail. The blonde grunted in frustration, while his boomerang brought itself back to his hand.

It didn't take Yugi too long to come back to shore. He shook the remaining water from his head before running to Joey. He made it to Joey's side. Rayquaza snarled at the sight of the two. "Ok, time to teach that monster a lesson," said Yugi, glaring back at Rayquaza.

"I thought you'd never ask," said Joey, looking at the long health bar above Rayquaza's head. It gave one last roar before flying over to the land, facing with the two smashers there.

Joey shoots another arrow at Rayquaza, only for it to be missed again. Yugi shoots a PK Fire at the beast, and it was a successful hit. The Pokemon was breifly encased in flames. Rayquaza roared in retaliation, making the air distort. It tilts its head and charges up a ball of bright energy in its mouth. Tilting its head back down to face Yugi and Joey, it fires the energy ball at them. The ball knocked them both away by a few feet.

The spectated gang gave shocked exclamations.

Yugi and Joey quickly got back up. Their damage percentages in the sky showed that they took over 30% of damage from just that one attack. As they faced Rayquaza again, it gave yet another distorting roar before digging into the ground.

"What's it doing now?!" Joey demanded.

**"Look out! It's using its Dig attack!" **Warned Mokuba.

Suddenlly, a bulge erected from the ground behind Yugi. He turned around to see the Sky Pokemon erupted from the ground. Nefore Yug could see it in the sky, it buried itself back into the ground. Yugi and Joey looked around in slight worry, hearing the rumble from under ground. "I don't like where dis is goin'," said Joey, and before he knows it, he found himself on top of another summoned bulge in the ground. Rayquaza struck out of the ground where Joey stood. He was knocked away by the attack, taking a lot more damage.

Rayquaza reappeared behind Yugi, staring down at him menacingly. Yugi whipped around to face the great beast. Before he could call out an attack, the Sky High Pokemon whipped its body around and smacked the spiky-headed teen away with its tail. Joey managed to grab his buddy before he hit the ground.

As the boys prepares to retaliate, Rayquaza flew away.

"Hey!" Joey screams, "What are ya, a Sky High dragon or a Sky High chicken?!"

**"Um, Joey?" **Called Mokuba, **"I don't think it's retreating."**

"What makes you say that?"

The large, green Pokemon turned back, this time, flying in a spiral and charging at the boys. Yugi pointed his finger and said, "Does that answer your question?"

With the dragon charging even faster, the two heroes rolled out of the way in the nick of time, however, it quickly turned around and charged again. In response, Joey whipped out his Master Sword and hits the monster with as it passed by. Rayquaza shrieked as it took a good amount of damage. As it stopped to turn around, Yugi's PK Thunder shocked it in the face. Joey threw his boomerang at the beast. It grazed the Pokemon's head the first time, and then whacked it in the back of the head as it retreated bac to Joey.

Yugi can see that the majority of Rayquaza's healthe have depleted. He smiled, "We're almost done with the second main boss, Joey!"

"I like the sound of dat, Yuge," the blonde replied.

However, Rayquaza's not ready to give up quite yet. It gave another distorting roar before soaring up in the sky. Yugi and Joey watched as they wonder what Rayquaza's up to. Yugi figured it might be its last attack, and probably its most powerful. The Sky High Pokemon formed its body into a circle and flew around.

The others back in the rec room can hear the sound of thunder. "Uh-oh," said Mokuba, "It's using its Thunder attack! Yugi! Joey! Be careful!"

But before the two can respond, thunder clouds showed up, and before they know it, a barrage of lightning bolt struck down to the ground. Frantically, Yugi and Joey ran around in hopes of dodging all of the bolts. Unfortunatly, one of the bolts hit Yugi. He was knocked closly to the invisible barrier, his damage is almost 100%.

"Yugi!" Cried Joey as the thunder attack ceased. "You alright, buddy?!"

The spiky-haired bo slowly got up, but he pulled up a thumb up to tell him he's good. Joey turned to the sky, where Rayquaza descended from the sky and back on the ground. The blonde swordsman in green glared at the green Pokemon. With his sword inhand, he dashes at the dragon with a battle cry.

Yugi sees his best friend attacking Rayquaza. He runs to his aid.

Joey slashes at the Pokemon's lower body. Eventually, he was swept away by its tail. Joey found himself on his back, as he stood up, he saw Yugi running up at the beast. The blonde looked at the see to see Yugi at near 90%. He turned back to Yugi, "Yugi, be careful! You're getting too weak!"

Yugi leaped into the air. "I'll be fine, Joey! PK Fire!" He called out his attack and launched another fiery bolt from his index fingers. Rayquaza was encased in flames again when the bolt made contact. The health bar above its head is almost gone. Yughi landed softly back on the ground. After the flames ceased, the Sky High Pokemon slams its tail to the ground to crush Yugi, but the short boy is qick enough to dodge every blow. Joey quickly got up and dashed to Yugi's aid with his sword still inhand.

Yugi is still dodging Rayquaza 's tail. He launched another PK Fire successfully at the Pokemon. It danced in flames yet again. Joey slashed his sword at the beast as he came by.

Yugi leaped backwards as he prepares on final attack of his own. While Rayquaza's attemtion is focused on Joey, Yugi concentrated and summoned PK Freeze. He focused hard to move the glowing snowflake close to the green Pokemon. Joey looked over his shoulder at the approaching snowflake and grinned. He leaped backwards and landed beside Yugi. "Well, it's nice NOT knowin' ya," said the blonde, giving Rayquaza a "See ya later" pose.

The monster looked up to see the snowflake closing in on him. Before it could act, the PK Freeze enter through its chest, and as soon as Yugi sopped focusing, the snowflake inside of Rayquaza exploded, reducing the rest of its health.

Explosions surrounded Rayquaza's body. It swung its body around uncontrollably before laying down on the ground. It rose its head up to give one last, agonizing roar, before it laid there, unmoving.

**(AN: Sorry for taking a while to update. I've been busy with school all month, and I'm gonna be even more busy by the end of April. This will most likely be the only update for this month, and I probably won't work on Chapter 26 until May. But anyways, hopefully this cool chapter will hold you guys over. Don't forget to leave a review for more support, if you would. Later!)**


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